


A Dream Reality

by Heretomakeamends



Category: The Mortal Instruments Series - Cassandra Clare
Genre: I am in denial about the existence of evil brothers and I'm dragging all of you with me, Multi, Originally Posted on FanFiction.Net, Slow Burn, change a couple of pre-story events and thus the whole shape of canon kind of deal
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-29
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-05-30 04:19:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 29
Words: 41,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15088850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heretomakeamends/pseuds/Heretomakeamends
Summary: Clary and Jonathan are Shadowhunters, but the blood in their veins has insured that they've never had much to do with the Clave. Until a chance meeting on the streets of New York with three gifted and deadly teenagers throws them into the Shadow World and right into the middle of a Downworlder uprising. They've finally found a place for themselves but will they even survive?





	1. Chapter 1

Clary had always had a knack for seeing through glamours, which was why she wasn't surprised when she spotted the three, prowling figures before her brother did. She held out a hand, stopping him in his tracks, "Jonathan look!"

He sighed, long since resigned to his sister's demands, "Where am I looking?"

"Directly across the street."

His green eyes narrowed in concentration, mentally peeling away the layers of magic to reveal what Clary had already seen; three black-clad teenagers stalking purposefully down the busy street, invisible to the mundanes around them.

"They're Shadowhunters!" she exclaimed excitedly.

He rolled his eyes, "I can see that thank-you. What I don't see is why that matters to us."

She poked her tongue at him, "It matters because they're probably one their way to do something awesome, we should follow them."

He was already shaking his head, "No. No way."

"Come on, it's my birthday!"

"Turing sixteen doesn't automatically save you from mom's wrath."

"You worry too much. Please, can you just this once do something childish and stupid?" Clary made her eyes go as big and pleading as she could, he caved.

"If we don't hurry up we're going to loose them."

She clapped her hands in delight, "Yes!"

Jonathan sighed, "I know I'm going to regret this."

Clary shot him a devilish look over her shoulder, already moving after her newfound quarry. "Almost definitely."

Clary and Jonathan had been following the teenagers for the past ten minutes and so far they had done nothing of any real interest. They were over a hundred metres in front, any closer and they would have realised they were being followed. Even from this distance the only reason they hadn't spotted the duo tailing them was the overcrowded nature of the street and their faith in their glamours. Jonathan seemed to be thinking the same thing, "They're relying on their glamours too much, if they were paying attention they would have noticed us."

"They probably think they're the only Shadowhunters in New York and who else is going to notice them when they're glamoured?" Clary reasoned.

"Any demon who bothers to look is going to notice and then they'll be in trouble."

"I don't know, it kind of seems like trouble is exactly what they're looking for." Clary went back to studying the figures ahead of them, there were two boys and one girl, all around the same age as her and Jonathan. The girl and one of the boys looked alike enough to be siblings, with their dark hair that contrasted perfectly against their pale skin. Even from behind Clary could tell they were gorgeous, both blessed with tall, lean bodies and graceful movements. But it was the second boy who caught and held Clary's attention.

He was like a Greek myth; a victim of Midas's golden touch, blonde hair and sun-kissed skin. And then he glanced behind him, his gaze travelling over the street and coming to rest on Clary. She did her best to emulate the expressions of the mundanes around her, as though she was looking through him as opposed to at him. He studied her and her heart quickened, it wasn't just his skin and hair that was gold, so were his eyes. Shadowhunters were made using the blood of an angel but this boy looked like one, too beautiful and remote to be human. He made her itch for her art supplies, this boy  _needed_  to be drawn.

He turned back to confer with his companions and Clary let go the breath she hadn't realised she was holding. Jonathan grabbed her arm "Did he see you?"

"He saw me, but I don't think he realised I could see him too." Jonathan sighed in relief, he may not have been thrilled by the idea at first but he had committed to this game, being spotted meant you had lost and defeat was not a concept Jonathan was comfortable with.

"I wish I had Heosphoros." Clary grumbled. She'd had the sword since she was old enough to carry it without impaling herself and she hated going anywhere without it. Jonathan shot her a side-long smile, "I'm first to admit that mundies are notoriously unobservant, but even they will notice a small girl with a large sword walking down the street." Clary elbowed him in the side for his comment on her height but had to admit he had a point. Besides, it wasn't a though she was unarmed, she had a seraph blade concealed in her jacket and a runed dagger in its special sheath in her combat boots. She also had a few important runes, inked onto her skin and hidden from the mundanes by her clothes. Jonathan had some too but nowhere near as many as the trio they were following, because of their glamours they had no need to hide them, they swirled across their skin, blackened lines burned onto their bodies in numbers so great their skin was nearly entirely covered. Runes for speed, strength, agility and of course glamours, Clary had never seen so many runes on a person in her whole life. Where ever they were headed they were clearly planning for a fight, a big one.

As they walked the foot traffic got thinner as they headed into a more industrial area. Scary looking dilapidated warehouses rose up on all sides and Clary and Jonathan were forced to stay even further back to avoid being spotted. Then the trio came to a particularly intimidating looking warehouse and after a quick discussion slipped inside. Clary burned with curiosity and wanted nothing more than to follow but Jonathan held her back, "Mom is going to go utterly ballistic if we die on your birthday, we're supposed to be home by 5 O'clock. If we're not there on time she'll probably send out a search party." It was true, Jocelyn Fairchild had an overprotective streak that made grizzly bears look tame.

"Come on Jonathan!" she knew she was whining but she couldn't help it, she desperately wanted to see where they were going, "It's not five yet and we've come all this way. Where's your sense of adventure?"

He raised one eyebrow and Clary seethed with jealousy, she been trying her entire life and she still couldn't pull off that expression. "I suspect it's in the same place as your sense of self-preservation." He quipped, but he let go of her arm and began moving toward the door that the others had slipped through so she knew she'd won the argument. He cracked it open and peeked inside, "Just don't do anything stupid." He said with the weary acceptance of a flight attendant giving safety directions they know on one is listening to. Then he led the way into the dark warehouse.


	2. Chapter 2

 

Despite the daylight outside they were plunged into darkness as soon as the door closed behind them. Clary briefly considered pulling the witchlight out of her back pocket but quickly dismissed the idea, it was never wise to announce your presence without first knowing who you were announcing it to. So instead she pulled out her stele, set it against her arm and began tracing the night vision rune onto her skin. It moved, like it always had, as though it was an extension of her body with no conscious thought necessary to draw the runes that she needed. The pain that drawing runes caused was accompanied as always, by the burning smell that never truly left a Shadowhunter's skin, but Clary didn't mind, fresh runes were familiar and comforting, like a piece of home. As soon as the rune was finished her vision sharpened, the room didn't get any brighter but suddenly she could see clearly, she reached out silently and took Jonathan's arm, setting her stele on his skin she drew the rune onto him as well. Jonathan rubbed the spot on his arm where the new rune had been burned, he didn't mind runes, but he'd never taken the same, almost masochistic pleasure in them either.

Now that her eyes were properly adjusted Clary could fully appreciate the vastness of the warehouse, even with the night vision rune the end was still swallowed in darkness and between there and where they were standing was a maze of conveyer belts, scaffolding and abandoned and broken machinery. Basically it was a hodgepodge of places for demonic beings to lie in wait for unsuspecting shadowhunters. She had to ask, "Do you think it's a trap?" Jonathan surveyed the space, "I don't think so, traps are supposed to catch people unawares, this place all but screams 'people go missing here'."

"It could be a really badly thought-out trap."

He inclined his head, "Possible, but it's more likely that it's a nest."

Clary screwed her nose up in disgust, demon nests were awful. Plenty of demons hunted in pairs or trios but a nest was five to twenty living together, it only ever occurred when there was a food-source that made it worthwhile. They were always dark and damp and stunk of demons and on the rare occasion that she and Jonathan had discovered one Clary couldn't help but wonder how many mundane's lives made coexistence worthwhile.

Jonathan caught the look on her face and gave her a wry smile, "You wanna keep going?"

Clary quickly readjusted her expression to one of practised indifference, a Shadowhunter trademark, and nodded.

"Alright then, you go that way," he pointed directly ahead, "I'll cover you from the elevated catwalk." He pointed in the general direction of the ceiling. Clary mentally kicked herself, so much for Shadowhunter skills; she could pull off a Shadowhunter facial expression but couldn't even scope-out a room properly. Jonathan grinned sidelong at her, "You should really learn to look properly Clarissa." He only ever called her Clarissa when he was angry or mocking her, 'Clary' was the hasty result of toddler Jonathan's tantrum over not being able to pronounce his little sister's name and it was what she'd been called ever since. The only other person who called her Clarissa was her mother, and even then, only when she was in a great deal of trouble. She poked her tongue at him and began marching in the direction he had indicated, she heard a derisive chuckle and then the unmistakeable groaning of rusted metal as he began to climb the ladder to the catwalk.

Clary crept through the darkness, wincing every time she accidently kicked one of the numerous metal pipes lying over the floor. Even a lifetime of shadowhunter training couldn't completely erase her clumsy streak and it always seemed to show itself at the most inconvenient of times, like when she was trying to be stealthy. She walked carefully around yet another suspended chassis, she'd walked under one a few minutes ago and had had terrible visions of the chain rusting through and the whole thing landing on her head, since then she'd avoided them. She was beginning to wonder if they would ever find anything when she heard a demon scream up ahead and saw the bright flash of a witchlight flaring up. Clary ran, pausing only long enough to draw her seraph blade out and name it.

"Raphael." She shouted, watching as the blade sparked to life, above her she heard Jonathan doing the same thing, followed by the sound of feet on metal as he sprinted off again. Clary hurled her body forward, racing towards the bright light and the sounds of fighting. The cold calm of battle descended on her and she smiled as she finally reached the conflict site. There were at least twenty ravener demons crammed together in a kind of sunken pit in the floor and as Clary had predicted it  _stunk_.

She took a moment to survey the scene around her, the demons had clearly been surprised and despite their few numbers the shadowhunters were defiantly holding their own. The boy with dark hair was standing calmly on the edge of the pit with a bow and arrows, disrupting all attempts made by the demons to organise themselves and generally causing mass panic. He shot to wound, leaving the injured creatures to be dispatched by the other two, who were standing in the pit, unflinchingly surrounded by grotesque many eyed monsters, killing anything that got within range of their weapons. The girl was holding two electrum whips, lashing with vicious skill at the demons around her. The golden boy was even better, he held a blazing seraph blade in each hand and moved so fast he seemed to blur.

_I only know of one other person who can move like that._

Even as the thought entered her head she saw a blur of movement, a graceful body falling through the air. Jonathan had launched himself from the catwalk at a height that would have broken the legs of any normal person, even a shadowhunter, but he landed effortlessly and, without faltering for an instant, through himself into the battle.

 _He's such a show-off._ Clary thought as she ran forward, summersaulting neatly into the pit after him. A ravener turned towards her and she buried her seraph blade up to the hilt in its domed skull, right above the black cluster of eyes. She pulled the blade back out and took a hurried step back in an attempt to avoid the worst of the ichor splattering as the demon exploded in a shower of gore, the way they always did. She still caught a few droplets though, the acid-like blood burning into her cheeks and the backs of her hands, she knew when the fight was over it would hurt, but for now she could barely feel it.

While her attention was being held by the first creature a second had snuck up behind her. She turned to face it, bringing her blade up once again, but before she could take so much as a step towards it an arrow appeared in its eye socket, effectively dealing with the problem. Clary spun around, looking for the source, and locked eyes with the boy still providing cover fire. His eyes were a beautiful, icy blue and he was regarding her with no small amount of confusion, no doubt wondering who the hell she was. Clary gave him a wide smile and he nodded to her in bemusement before returning his attention back to the fight. Clary waded through the mass of demons, stabbing one scaly, reptilian monster after another. Then she heard the girl cry out for help, "Alec!" most likely the name of one of the boys with her. Clary turned towards the sound, a ravener had used its barbed tail to knock her off her feet was now advancing on the prone figure. Clary raced forward and plunged her blade into its back, it screamed in pain, turning to face its new attacker and wrenching the seraph blade from her grasp. She reached for her dagger but never made it that far, one of the girl's whips made a deadly arc through the air, slicing the ravener's head clean off. It disintegrated, showering both her and the other girl in burning ichor. Clary leaned down reaching out a hand to help her to her feet, the girl had been staring at Clary in shock but quickly snapped her mouth shut and grasped her hand, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet. At full height she towered over Clary, not that that was hard,  _everyone_  towered over Clary. "Hi." The girl said. "Umm… Hi?" Clary replied, already turning to check on her brother.

Jonathan was standing in the midst of several puddles of ichor, grinning like a manic, he met Clary's eyes and she couldn't help but grin back, her eyes already moving past him once she verified his safety, in search of someone else.

The golden boy was fighting the two remaining demons, Clary stepped forward, removing her dagger from its sheath, drawing her arm back in a practiced gesture and then throwing it forward. It sailed through the air and imbedded itself in the first ravener's heart, the boy didn't skip a beat, turning and plunging his blade into the other beast then stepping back neatly to avoid the twin showers of ichor. The fight was over, it had only taken a few minutes.

"Who-"he spun around but the question died in his throat as he noticed the newcomers for the first time. His eyes locked with Clary and shock and recognition chased themselves across his face. Jonathan stepped forward and the boy's eyes flickered to him instead. "I'm Jonathan and this is my little sister Clary."

The beautiful girl stepped toward him, clearly taking it upon herself to do the introductions for her group, "I'm Isabelle Lightwood and these are my brothers, Alec and Jace." The golden boy, the one called Jace locked eyes with Clary again as he was introduced and he smirked before returning his attention to Jonathan. Alec had jumped into the pit with them and after applying an  _iratze_  rune to Jace was offering one to Jonathan. Jace, for his part had assumed an air of disinterest.

Isabelle stepped closer to Clary and she turned towards her, expecting thanks for saving the other girls life, instead, Isabelle kept her eyes on Jonathan, a small flirtatious smile curling her lips, "Is your brother single?" Clary rolled her eyes, some things never changed.


	3. Chapter 3

 

Alec cleared his throat, breaking the awkward silence that had befallen the group, "I hate to be the one to address the elephant in the room but what are you guys doing here?" Clary blushed and looked down at her feet, "We… followed you."

Jace's eyes widened, "That's why you look familiar, I saw you this morning." His eyes raked over Clary, making her blush even harder, "I thought you were a mundane, you sure look like a mundane." She shot him a hard look, "That's the point."

He raised an eyebrow,  _seriously_ _why can everyone do that but me!_ "Why is that the point? Do you live in New York?"

"Yes."

"Then why is this the first time we've ever seen you? Who the hell are you people?"

"We're…" she trailed off, it was the first time Clary had ever met a Shadowhunter who didn't know who she was, she didn't want them to know, didn't want to have to see the hate in their eyes. Jonathan saw what was going on in her head and changed the subject quickly, "I'm going to scout around and make sure there aren't any more demons hiding anywhere." Isabelle, still eyeing him in appreciation piped up, "I'll go with you!"

Jonathan grinned at her and Clary resisted the urge to groan, if those two were ' _scouting_ ' together the only thing they'd find were each other's lips. Apparently Alec was having the same thoughts because after glancing suspiciously at Jonathan he said, "I'll come too." Isabelle pouted but Jonathan just shrugged and the three of them set off into the darkness, Alec holding his witchlight out in front of him and Isabelle and Jonathan walking way closer to each other than necessary.

Using the illumination cast by the witchlight Jace was still holding, Clary began searching the ground. "What are you doing?" Jace asked sounding bored.

"I'm looking for my dagger."

"Do you have a particular attachment to it?"

"No, I try not to get attached to daggers, I'm always throwing them and sometimes they end up somewhere you don't want to get them back from, like something's stomach, but I try and keep track of them when I can." Jace was regarding her evenly and other than a small smile when she mentioned stabbing things in the stomach he gave no indication of what he was thinking.

"It's over there." He pointed to a spot a few metres away from her. She strode over and picked it up, wiping the ichor on her pants and stowing it in its boot sheath.

"So you've been in a few fights?" he asked, a not-so-subtle attempt to uncover more information about her. Clary cast around for a topic of conversation that didn't involve her past, "So… you don't look much like Isabelle and Alec." A second after the words left her mouth she realised it might be a touchy subject but he just huffed in exasperation, "Observant little thing aren't you?" Clary bristled, the guy might look like an angel, but she was beginning to realise he was a bit of an ass. "Well?"

"Well what?" he asked a smirk curling his lips.

"Are you going to answer the question?"

"Technically you didn't ask a question."

By this point Clary was regretting putting away her dagger; she could have thrown it at Jace. "Fine. Are you going to answer the  _implied_  question?"

He laughed, "So persistent! I was adopted, my parents died before I was born."

Something about the way he said it struck Clary as odd, ' _before_  I was born'. She realised she knew this guy, or his story anyway. She took a step towards him, "Stephan Herondale died and his wife committed suicide their son-"

"Was cut out of her cold, dead body." He finished bitterly.

Clary took another step towards him, "You're Jace Herondale." He flinched and glared at her, his eyes burning with anger, "Don't call me that! My father was a cowardly murderer I don't want his name."

_That sounds familiar._

"Not wanting a name doesn't stop it from being yours, you are a Herondale whether you hate your father or not and at some point you're going to have to step up and claim it or it's going to own you instead of the other way around."

Jace's hands clenched and unclenched around his seraph blade but when he spoke his voice still held that carefully cultivated indifference that Clary was already beginning to see through. "You sound as though you speak from experience, are you going to tell me who you are now?"

She shouldn't have said anything, should have let him wallow in his self-pity, let him think his father's legacy was bad, he had no idea. And she shouldn't answer his question now, but even as she had the thought her mouth was already forming the words that would make this beautiful boy hate her forever. "My mother's name is Jocelyn Garroway now; but she's been married before. My full name is Clarissa Adele Morgenstern, you may have heard of my father?" Jace's reaction was not at all unexpected but it still hurt somewhere deep inside, shock and suspicion warred across his features and suspicion won. He stepped back, raising his seraph blade to point at her face. However, Clary had had a lifetime of dealing with this kind of behaviour so instead of bursting into tears, which is what she wanted to do, she pretended his reaction didn't touch her. In fact as she had during so many other encounters she pretended she found his reaction amusing, there was nothing that irritated a Shadowhunter more than someone who wasn't afraid of him.

She shot Jace a devilish grin and reached into her boot, "What are you doing?" He sounded incredulous, as though he couldn't believe that she would be stupid enough to attack him. She ignored him and pulled her dagger out, handing it hilt-first to Jace, "You can't have armed prisoners now can you?" Jace's lips quirked like he was trying not to laugh at her and his blade wavered. She stepped back so that she was standing just outside the witchlight and Jace began questioning her.

"So your brother is-"

"Yes," Clary said impatiently, "My brother is also my father's son. Well spotted Jace." He glared at her and she laughed, what did he expect with a question that stupid?

He opened his mouth to ask a new one, hopefully more intelligent than the last, but he never got the chance.

"What the hell are you doing?"

Jonathan had returned, and he was staring at Jace with undisguised fury.

Jace began explaining the situation to Alec and Isabelle, a task made harder buy the fact that Jonathan was yelling at him for pointing a weapon at his unarmed sister, but Clary was barely listening to any of them. She heard at noise behind her and began to turn towards the sound, which probably saved her life. A ravener's barbed tail, meant for her heart, transfixed her upper arm instead, it wasn't an instantly fatal wound but her arm still exploded in agony so intense and unexpected that she couldn't even scream. She gave a strangled moan as the tail withdrew, arching back for another attack, but then Jace was there, standing in front of her with seraph blades blazing. At first Clary thought he was glowing but the she realised her eyesight was simply blurring, already affected by the demon poison that was pulsing through her veins. She didn't see him kill the demon, she was far too distracted by the sickening way the world was tilting all of a sudden, but he must've done it quickly because when her knees began to buckle a few seconds later he caught her and lowered her gently to the ground. He lent over her and Clary realised it was the first time since she'd seen him that he actually looked concerned about something, the thought made her laugh. She raised her arm and was momentarily alarmed by how heavy it felt all of a sudden, but the thought drifted away as quickly as it had come and she pressed her fingers to the lines at his brow, attempting to smooth them out. She giggled again, "You look worried."

His expression softened slightly, "You look delirious." His words were muffled as he spoke against her fingers which had moved to his lips and were trying to force him into a smile. Then another form appeared above her, catching and holding her hand, she took a moment to identify him as her vision grew steadily worse, "Jon," she breathed, smiling up at him.

"Yes Clary?"

"Your scouting could use some work."

He snorted sarcastically "Funny, aren't you?" She turned back to Jace, as her vision darkened he became the easiest thing to see, he was so  _bright._  "Jace?"

"Mmhmm?"

"I can't feel my arm anymore." He looked down at his hand were it was clamped around her arm to stop the bleeding, Jonathan reached out, stroking her face, "Shh you're fine."

"No she's not," Clary hadn't seen Alec approach and she heard his voice as if she was underwater, "The  _iratze_  keep fading." Jonathan swore and Jace said, "She's so tiny the poison's probably working twice as fast on her. We need to take her to the Institute, Hodge can help." He moved to pull her into his arms but Jonathan pushed him back, "I'll take her." He lifted her as though she weighed nothing, "Jonathan," she'd meant to sound reproachful but her voice was too soft, "don't be mean."

From somewhere behind her she heard Jace laugh, and then the world faded to black.


	4. Chapter 4

 

The first thing Clary saw when she opened her eyes were cherubs, honest to goodness chubby, baby angels, surrounded by golden ribbon and fluffy clouds. She groaned, "Please don't tell me heaven is really this cliché."

A male voice next to her chuckled, "Only you would mock heaven within hours of escaping it." She turned her head to the side and saw Jonathan sitting in a chair next to her bed. "I escaped it years ago big brother, everyone knows when I die I'm going straight down." He laughed again and she took a moment to examine her surroundings, she was clearly in some kind of a medical room, her linen-sheeted bed was one of a long row of identical ones, all complete with metal headboards and generic nightstands, lace curtains blocked the light from the windows but not the ever present sound of New York traffic, she went back to examining the ceiling, "Honestly I think it's just tempting fate to paint heaven on the roof of a sickroom. Where are we anyway?"

Jonathan couldn't keep the excitement off his face as he replied, "We're in the New York Institute!"

"That is so awesome! How long have I been out?"

His face instantly grew serious, "A few hours, they had to give you all sorts of potions before you were strong enough for the runes to work." He heaved a great shuddering sigh and grabbed her hand, squeezing so hard her bones grinded together, "I thought you were going to die Clary, I would never forgive myself if something happened to you." She extracted her hand with a wince and moved it instead to cup his chin, "But I didn't die okay? I'm fine and I'm not your responsibility."

He brushed her hand away, "Of course you are, you're my little sister."

"That doesn't mean you always have to be there, fixing everything when I make a mistake and blaming yourself if you can't."

He raised an eyebrow, "Do you want me to stop looking out for you Clarissa?"

"Of course not!" She scoffed, "I'd be dead in a week without you to talk me out of my crazier ideas, but I just wish you'd let yourself off the hook a bit more."

He laughed, "Remember when you wanted to climb the Statue of Liberty?" She laughed too, "I still haven't entirely abandoned that idea."

"Of course you haven't, may the angel be with anyone who tries to tell Clary Morgenstern what she can and can't do."

Clary laughed again and then made to sit up but stopped, "Where are my clothes?"

Jonathan frowned, "They were covered in ichor and blood, I think Jace burned them."

She felt her cheeks getting hot, "He didn't… you know-" she gestured to herself and Jonathan's expression darkened, "Take them off? By the angel no, I would have snapped him in half. Izzy did it."

"Already on nickname basis huh Jon?" she teased lightly, mostly to distract herself from the fact that the breathtakingly beautiful Isabelle Lightwood had seen her naked, her self-esteem just took a nosedive off a cliff.

"Yeah," he grinned, "she's mega hot!"

Clary rolled her eyes, "You're not shallow at all."

"Hey!" He protested, "I just call it how I see it. Anyway, I figured you wouldn't want to wear her clothes so I went back to the house and got you a bag of your own."

He plopped it down on her knees but she wasn't paying attention to it, "You've been home?" she exclaimed, "but that means-". He nodded, "Mom and Luke know."

"Was it really bad?"

He looked sheepishly down at his feet, "I have no idea, I didn't have the guts to face her, I climbed in through your bedroom window, grabbed your stuff, left and then sent her a text."

She snorted, "Chicken!"

Jonathan glared at her, "It's alright for you! Just wait, this'll be my fault, I guarantee it."

"Whatever, I'm going to go and get changed."

She picked up the bag, wrapped a sheet securely around herself and walked to the bathroom.

After a long hot shower and back in skinny jeans and a black tank top Clary felt more herself than she had since she woke up, she examined her reflection in the mirror, she looked pale and her lips were dry and cracking. Her tank top showed off all the scars on her arms from runes, plus a new one on her upper arm from the ravener attack. It was an angry red colour but Clary new it would fade to white in a couple of days, all in all she looked quite good for someone who'd nearly died.

When she left the bathroom Jonathan stood up, handing her a bundle of possessions that had survived incineration, her keys, phone, wallet, combat boots, her dagger and her stele.

She huffed, "What am I supposed to do with these? I assume he burned my jacket too?" Jonathan nodded.

"Dammit! That was my favourite!"

She pulled the combat boots on and slipped the dagger into its sheath, the keys, phone and wallet went into the pockets of her jeans and after a moment of deliberation she decided just to carry her stele.

"All right, I'm ready shall we-"

Her question was cut off by the sound off the infirmary doors opening she looked up, Jace was standing framed in the doorway.

He looked her up and down, "Oh good you're alive!" For a moment she was pleased that he was glad she was okay but the next words out of his mouth quashed that feeling, "Izzy owes me ten dollars!"

Clary spluttered, "You put bets on that? You have got to be kidding me!"

He gave her a sly grin, "If it makes you feel any better I bet on you living."

"Oh, well that's all right then." She said, every word dripping with sarcasm.

"I thought it would be, anyway I only came to tell you your family is here."

Jonathan swore and Jace raised an eyebrow, Clary shrugged, "I doesn't matter that I survived the night, mom's going to kill us both anyway."

His lips twitched, "Well they're already rather hysterical so you might want to hurry this up."

Her shoulders slumped, she stepped towards Jace in the doorway, but Jonathan called out to her. She turned back towards him, "Considering your near-death experience maybe you should go eat something, I'll try to head mom off."

She gave him a hug, "Thank you, you're awesome!"

He smiled, "I know I am. Wish me luck."

Clary laughed, "You're facing the wrath of Jocelyn Garroway, you don't need luck you need a miracle."

He lifted his eyes to Jace, "Can you…?"

Jace nodded, "I'll get her some food." Jonathan nodded his head in thanks and then slipped passed him into the hall, after a moment Jace turned as well, heading in the opposite direction and clearly expecting Clary to follow.

She ran after him, his legs were so long his strides were worth two of hers, when she finally caught up to him she cast around for something to say.

"So…" she hedged, "So…" he copied, mocking her.

"You've met my family than."

He nodded, "Your stepfather is a werewolf."

"Yes, he is." she said coldly.

"But that's, well, frowned upon. Strongly." he sounded surprised.

"Don't be so naïve, Jace, not everyone is terrified of the clave."

He glared at her, clearly not appreciating the 'naïve' thing, "Shadowhunters aren't supposed to marry Downworlders!"

"My mother isn't a Shadowhunter, not really. When she left Idris after valentine died she wanted nothing more to do with them, except she had two Shadowhunter children. She wanted us to be able to protect ourselves, so she trained us, but she hasn't fought a demon or worn a rune since before I was born." A few years ago, she'd broken her arm and despite Clary's and Jonathan's pleadings, had completely refused a healing rune, instead she healed like a mundane, her arm was in a cast for weeks.

"She hasn't been officially dismissed by the clave!"

"What does it matter? It's not as if they'd want Valentine's wife. Or his children for that matter." She couldn't keep the bitterness out of her voice. Jace stared at her for a moment than pushed open the door Clary hadn't even realised they had stopped in front of, "This is the kitchen."

Isabelle Lightwood was standing at the stove, stirring a pot and surrounded by an assortment of ingredients Clary couldn't imagine could possibly taste any good together.

She looked up from the concoction and smiled, "Hi Jace, Hello Clary, good see you're not dead." Jace walked passed her to the fridge and Isabelle handed him a ten dollar note, he caught Clary watching and winked at her, she wanted to hit him so badly.

Isabelle turned back to her and lifted a ladle of the strange smelling mixture toward her, "Want any soup?"

Over Isabelle's shoulder Jace caught Clary's eye and shook his head vigorously, "Umm… No thank you." She replied, Isabelle shrugged and went back to stirring. Jace grabbed an apple out of the fridge and threw it to Clary and then grabbed one for himself.

"What about you Jace, do you want any soup?"

Jace shuddered and then replied hurriedly, "No thanks Izzy I'm not really hungry." And without further ado he grasped Clary's arm and dragged her out of the room.

As soon as the door closed behind them she turned to him, "Is Isabelle's soup really that bad?"

He grinned ruefully at her, "Her mom, Maryse, is and amazing cook, but she never taught Izzy. Sometimes I think we don't even need seraph blades to kill demons, we could just feed them all Izzy's cooking."

Clary laughed and after a moment he joined in, then he grabbed her arm again, "Come on–I'll show you around."

Clary saw the armoury and the training arena, plus lots of empty rooms. Jace was amused by her enthusiasm in everything she saw, and amazed when she told him she'd never been inside an institute before, "Never? Why not?"

She rolled her eyes, "You know who I am Jace, would I really be welcome? Anyway," she said curiously, already moving on from talk of her parentage, "How many people live here?

He studied her for a moment then sighed, "The institute can hold a lot of people but it's usually just me, Alec, Isabelle, Hodge, Maryse, Robert and Max. But Max, Robert and Maryse are on a business trip right now."

"That sounds kind of lonely."

He shrugged, "Could be worse."

They arrived outside a door Jace told her was the library, and she could tell it was their destination because she could hear an awful lot of shouting inside. She sighed, "Back to reality I guess."

Jace wasn't looking at her so she wasn't entirely sure she heard him right when he said, "You could always stay." Her eyes widened, "What?"

He shrugged, "You could always stay here." He repeated with the air of explaining something simple to someone incredibly stupid, but he still didn't meet her gaze, so she had no idea how he felt about the proposal. Before she could think too much on it however, he had pushed the door open and stepped inside, dragging her with him. The arguing cut off immediately as all eyes in the room turned to them, the silence stretched for a moment, laden with tension. Then one particularly loud, particularly angry voice broke it, "Clarissa Adele Morgenstern, you are in more trouble than you have ever been in your entire life!"


	5. Chapter 5

 

The library was the most beautiful room Clary had ever seen, but she didn't have time to take it in because standing in the centre with her hands on her hips and wearing a glare that could send warriors running, was her mother. Jocelyn looked beautiful, as always, people were constantly telling Clary how much she looked like her, but Clary had never been able to see it. They both had slender frames, but Jocelyn's hair was a few shades darker red, she even had a graceful, self-assured way of walking that Clary had always been too self-conscious to pull off. Next to her, with hair more orange than red, a liberal smattering of freckles and ridiculously small stature, she felt like a Raggedy Ann being compared to a Barbie doll. Jace let go of her arm and settled himself in a chair, Clary really wished he would leave but it appeared as though he was settling himself in to watch her family dysfunction.

Numbly, she realised she was still standing in the doorway, and still being yelled at. She shifted until she was leaning against a bookshelf next to Jonathan, he shot her a tight smile and whispered, "Thank god you're here, she'd nearly run out of creative ways to call me irresponsible."

Clary couldn't help it, she laughed.

"Oh, you think this is funny, do you?" Clary was almost surprised to see there wasn't steam coming out of her mother's ears, she certainly looked angry enough.

"Of course not mom but-"

She was cut off before she could even finish half a sentence, "Gave Luke and I a heart attack, you'd been missing for hours and then we finally get a text from your brother, at three o'clock in the morning no less, telling us that you're dying in an Institute!"

"I distinctly remember saying that she was fine, get your facts straight woman." Muttered Jonathan beside her, but he was careful to pitch his voice low enough to be out of earshot of their angry mother.

"and you Jonathan, why were you letting her fight demons in the first place?" Jonathan shot Clary a look that clearly said,  _'See? I told you I'd be blamed for this.'_  But Clary was to indignant to care, "I am perfectly capable of fighting demons! I'm sixteen years old and I can handle myself! I don't  _need_  Jonathan!"

"Besides," Jonathan chose that moment to pipe up, "have _you_  ever tried to dissuade Clary from something she wants to do? I'd have more luck convincing demons to become pacifists."

Jocelyn chose to ignore this comment and instead went back to attacking Clary, "Exactly! Sixteen Clarissa! You don't know everything; I can't believe you would endanger your life like that, and for what? Because you were  _bored_?"

Clary was now yelling in earnest, "I'm a Shadowhunter mother! We all risk our lives! It's our job! You have to stop being so overprotective!"

"You just wait till you have kids Clarissa, and then they go around disobeying you and putting themselves in mortal peril!"

"Then why do you bother with us if we're so damned awful?"

Clary was horrified to see her mother's eyes well with tears, "Because I love you both so much! I was so worried!"

"I'm sorry mom, don't cry, please don't cry." She covered the distance in a heartbeat and wrapped her mother in her arms, ignoring as she went, Jonathan's cough, which sounded suspiciously like "PMS."

Now that she was no longer locked in a battle of wills, Clary allowed her attention to wander and take in more of the room, they were standing directly in front of a magnificent desk, the weathered oak had been carved into a huge slab and was resting, rather disturbingly, on the backs of two oak angels, their faces twisted into masks of suffering. There was also a series of glass fragments and semi-precious jewels inlayed in the polished wood floor, they seemed to form some sort of picture.  _Probably the angel Raziel_ , Clary thought wryly _, if the tapestries, statuary and paintings through-out the rest of the Institute were anything to go by. Shadowhunters are nothing if not predictable._ It was then that she realised that there were more people in the room then she had first thought. Jace, whom Clary had nearly forgotten about, was still sitting in the armchair by the unlit fire, watching their exchange like a strange, verbal tennis match; and over in the corner of the room was Luke. Her step-father was deep in conversation with a man Clary had never seen before but she supposed he must be Hodge. He looked a bit like a college professor, with his neat, tweed suit and grey hair, but the image was ruined somewhat, by the thick scar that marred the right side of his face. Then the lump in Luke's arms, which until then had looked like a coat or blanket, shifted and Clary realised that he was holding her baby sister, who had somehow slept through the entire screaming match.

The sound of Jocelyn's voice snapped Clary out of her reverie, "All your stuff is packed in the car, we need to leave soon or we're going to be late." Clary stiffened in her mother's embrace and pulled back so that she could talk face to face, "Late for what?"

Her mother rolled her eyes, "Silly Clary, have you forgotten what day it is already? We're going to stay at the farm remember? Your grandparents and aunt Amatis are portaling out for your birthday, we need to be there to meet them and we have a long drive ahead of us."

Clary resisted the urge to pull a face, in keeping with her mother's I-am-no-longer-a-Shadowhunter stance she resolutely refused to portal anywhere, instead forcing them all into long car trips with a screaming baby. But then Jace's words came back to her,  _'You could always stay here',_ she squared her shoulders, it was now or never.

"Well, do you think maybe… it would be okay if we… you know…"

"Just spit it out Clary!" her mother snapped, half amused, half impatient.

She took a deep breathe, "Can we stay in the Institute? Just for a little while?"

Jocelyn's eyes narrowed, "Absolutely not!"

"But mom, I've never seen an Institute before and it's totally amazing and I just want a bit longer and it's my  _birthday_!"

"It was your birthday yesterday, and I can't cancel on my parents and Amatis now!"

"So don't! Jon and I will stay, you, Luke and Ella can go and spend the week with them, they won't even notice we're not there they'll be too busy gushing over Ella!" She gestured to her sister, still sleeping in Luke's arms.

"Have you actually discussed this with anyone Clarissa? You can't just force yourself on these people!" She opened her mouth to reply, but no sound came out, she  _had_  discussed it with someone, but somehow, she didn't think her mother would find Jace's opinion valid. She needn't have worried though because Hodge spoke up, "It's really no trouble at all, it's not as if we don't have the room." Fast running out of allies Jocelyn scanned the room, her eyes coming to rest on her husband, "Luke?"

He sighed, "I think you should let them hon, Clary's right, they're not little kids anymore and they'll be quite safe at the Institute. Plus, this place is a part of who they are, you have to let them experience it."

Clary beamed at him, it wasn't often he went against their mother and his opinion tended to count for a lot as the voice of reason in a house full of irrational red-heads and teenagers. Her mother sighed in defeat, "Fine, you can stay." Clary restrained herself from jumping for joy, Jocelyn held up a finger, "I have a few conditions, I'll call you every night and you'd better answer!"

"Done."

"Don't go anywhere alone."

"Of course not."

"Don't go to any parties."

"Wouldn't dream of it."

"Don't leave the Institute without Jonathan."

She sighed, "Fine."

Jocelyn pulled her into a bone-crushing hug, "Be good! We'll celebrate your birthday properly when we get back.", then moved on to hug Jonathan. Luke stepped up to Clary and wrapped his free arm around her, "See you 'round kiddo." She hugged him back, "See you Luke." She kissed the top of Ella's head, "Bye, bye cutie, see you soon."

Jonathan gently extracted himself from their rather teary mother and reminded her gently, "You're late mom."

"Oh, of course, time to go." She dashed her eyes impatiently, and smiled weakly, "I'll talk to you tonight." Then she left, Luke propelling her out the door by her arm.

Clary turned to share their victory with her brother, but he was already talking to Hodge, there was however, another person looking at her. Jace smirked, "Congratulations on your new-found freedom, though your persuasive skills leave much to be desired."

She glared at him, "Don't pretend you didn't enjoy it, I saw you watching like we were some sort of demented reality show."

He frowned, "What's a reality show?"

She shook her head, "Never mind."

He broke into a lazy grin, "I've never seen Shadowhunters yell at their parents before."

She shot him a quizzical look, "Really?"

He nodded, "Yep, we're usually bought up with more respect and manners than that."

Clary snorted at the idea of Jace having manners. He pointed a finger ominously at her, "You may laugh, but I can be very charming when I want to be."

"Apparently the mood doesn't take your fancy often."

A slow smile spread across his face, "Exactly! Why sweep people off their feet when you can make mortal enemies instead!"

"Why indeed."

They grinned at each other for a few seconds longer and then Jace frowned slightly and said, "I'll go tell Izzy and Alec we have guests." He left the room without so much as a backward glance.

Clary felt a presence next to her and turned, Jonathan was standing there but instead of looking pleased, like she'd expected, he looked slightly weary, "Hodge knows about the angel's blood, he wants to talk to me about it."

Clary felt the slight stirrings of panic, "How does he know?"

"I have no idea, but I can guess." Her brother muttered darkly, she opened her mouth to reply but saw that Jace was back and walking towards them. Hastily changing the subject, she said, "Anyway, when you were getting me a change of clothes did you manage to grab my sword?"

He raised one eyebrow, "I couldn't find it. Your room is disgusting Clary."

She glared at him and muttered, somewhat defensively, "It's under my pillow."

"Yeah? Well there's so much crap piled everywhere I was lucky to find your bed let alone anything hidden in it."

"But I need it Jonathan! I have to go get it."

He shook his head, "I'm busy right now and there's no way you're going on your own, so you'll just have to wait."

She opened her mouth to protest but a smooth voice cut her off, "I'll take her if you like." She turned back to Jace, taking in his relaxed stance and devilish smile she made what was probably a stupid call, "Sounds like a great idea."


	6. Chapter 6

 

Jonathan narrowed his eyes, "He can't take you, mom specifically said you weren't to leave the Institute without me."

Clary shrugged, "Since when have either of us done what mom says? Besides, you're both tall, blonde and arrogant, practically the same person."

This earned her matching glares from Jace and Jon, "See? You're even pulling the same expression!"

They turned their glares on each other, Jonathan grabbed her arm and lead her out of earshot of Jace, "Why are you doing this Clary? You can't wait fifteen minutes to go get your sword?"

She crossed her arms defiantly, "You have no idea how long you'll take and this is the longest I have ever been without Heosphoros! I  _need_  my sword back!"

"So this has nothing to do with Jace?" The question caught her off guard, "What do you mean?"

Jonathan eyed her shrewdly, "This isn't some elaborate scheme to spend time with the golden boy himself is it?"

Her cheeks grew warm, but she rolled her eyes, "Yes Jon, it's all a conspiracy! I nearly died of demon poisoning on my birthday so that I could spend more time with a guy I'd never met before."

He rolled his eyes as well, "Fine, but be careful, like you said, you've never met him before, I think he's fine but still, you shouldn't trust him, not yet. Oh, and can you grab my sword too? And another couple of changes of clothes? Looks like we'll be here a while."

Clary smiled up at him "Sure." Then she turned and walked back to Jace, he raised one eyebrow in a silent question, her smile grew wider, "I'm with you." He nodded once and then led her through the Institute.

Once outside, Jace immediately turned and began walking. "Wait!" Clary called after him, cursing her short legs, "Where are you going?" He smirked over his shoulder, "The nearest subway station is a few blocks from here, after that, well, I assume you know where you live?"

Clary growled in frustration, this guy was infuriating. They walked the rest of the way in silence, Clary studiously ignoring her companion which seemed to amuse him no end.

They reached their destination and Clary had to break her stony silence to tell Jace which train to take. They boarded the correct one and Clary immediately regretted not applying a glamour rune. She'd never had any kind of a problem with mundanes before, so her sudden, fervent desire to hide from them was not without good reason.

For one thing she'd been carrying her stele around in her hand since she woke up at the Institute, but she'd had to hide it in her boot when they got to the station, it was now sitting pressed rather uncomfortably against her ankle. But mostly the problem was Jace.

They'd taken seats next to each other and now Clary wished she'd sat further away, or possibly on a different train all together. It was rather packed, and when Jace got on every eye turned to him and most didn't look away. Clary had forgotten how attractive he really was. Okay, that was a lie, but she  _had_ forgotten that she wasn't the only person whose heart skipped a beat every time he looked at them. And to make matters worse, they were sitting almost directly across from a group of giggling teenage girls.

From the moment Clary and Jace sat down together they'd turned to each other and began discussing everything from his golden eyes to his abs, Clary had no idea how they knew he had abs but they seemed certain that he did. She was sure that if she could hear the girls than so could Jace, but he gave no indication of it,  _Maybe he's ignoring them?_  The thought made Clary's spirits lift, but then another possibility occurred, he was simply waiting for one of them to make a move, it didn't improve her mood. She tuned back into the other girl's conversation in time to realise they'd moved onto an equally pressing topic of conversation, Clary. Mostly the fact that there was no way in hell a guy like Jace would be interested in a girl like her. It was true, but that didn't stop her feeling like crap when the other girls came to the conclusion instantaneously. They turned to a number of different theories as to why he would be spending time with her in the first place, including, but not limited to; siblings; that one made her quite uncomfortable and out of the corner of her eye she thought she saw Jace pull a face, friends; a pity date; at that point Clary was scowling fiercely and about ready to get up and smack them. And her personal favourite, "Maybe they're in some kind of a cult? Look at their tattoos." which sparked an obsessive discussion over whether or not cult activity could be considered 'hot'.

Inevitably one of the bolder girls got up to talk to him, she had long, dark hair, tight clothes and was, admittedly, quite beautiful. Clary rolled her eyes, trying to fight off her sudden, irrational irritation.

The girl strutted over in her sky-high heels and stopped in front of Jace, her chest thrusting out suggestively.

"Hi, my name's Renee, do you want to do something with me sometime?" She cocked her hip and smiled winningly, already sure of the answer. Clary snorted, she really didn't waste time with small talk did she? Renee gave her a cold stare, "Oh? And who are you?" Her tone made it obvious she didn't really care. Clary gave her a big grin and stuck her hand out to be shaken, replying in a falsely cheerful voice, "Hi I'm Clary, it's great to meet you." The girl was taken aback by her chipper tone and turned rather forcefully back to Jace. Clary let her unshaken hand fall into her lap and glared at the side of the other girl's head.

Renee was now going to even greater lengths, biting her lip flirtatiously she said, "Well? You haven't answered yet." Her chest, if possible, trust out even further. Clary laughed aloud. Renee turned back to her and in the voice one might use to address a three year old said, "Is something funny dear?"

Clary leaned back in her seat and smiled scathingly, "I was just thinking, you should get desperate tattooed on your forehead, it might be less obvious,  _dear_." Renee spluttered in indignation, "What did you just say to me?" she screeched.

Clary gave her her best Shadowhunter glare, the one that said, 'you do not want to mess with me'. "I said go away,  _mundie_." She'd never used the term mundane as an insult before, it was a sign of how furious  _'Renee'_  was making her, she'd dealt with mean girls before, but that was at school where she was supposed to keep her head down and go unnoticed. It was nice to be able give the girl a little of her own medicine, she just wished this whole thing felt less like it was about Jace. Renee backed off rather quickly, but not before she slipped Jace her number, shooting poisonous glares at Clary all the while.

Luckily, Clary and Jace's stop arrived shortly after, which prevented Clary from doing anything she'd really regret, like 'accidently' letting Renee see her dagger. They got off the train and Clary saw Jace slip a small piece of paper with a number on it into his pocket. She stayed silent for the rest of the journey.

By the time her house was in sight Clary's mind had shifted focus from her own mixed up emotions to a different, but not unrelated matter. Jace was certainly not her brother, nor would Clary count them as friends, they weren't dating, pity or otherwise and they definitely weren't cult members, but that still posed the question, why  _had_  Jace volunteered to do this? She stopped abruptly and turned to him, he shot her an irritated look, "Are you finally talking to me again?" She ignored his question, "Why are you here?" His expression seemed caught between confusion and annoyance, "I followed you, I assumed you knew where you were going but if I was wrong-"

She cut him off, "No, I mean why are you here? As in, on this short escapade?"

His expression cleared, "Oh! Well I had nothing better to do and I felt like getting out of the Institute for a while so…" Clary's heart plummeted slightly, she didn't know what she'd been expecting, but this answer, probable as it was, was somehow disappointing all the same. But something about the way his eyes jumped about as he said it made her suspect he wasn't being one hundred percent truthful. Before she could press him further however, he cut her off, "Okay now I've answered one of your questions you have answer one of mine. Why did you scare that poor mundie girl half to death? You weren't jealous were you?" His smirk was maddening.

Clary crossed her arms and glared at him, "First; technically that was two questions, second; 'that poor mundie girl' started it, she tried to treat me like I was nothing, it made me mad and third; of course I wasn't jealous, I barley know you!"

It was true that she barely knew him, she wasn't entirely sure that she was being truthful, to Jace or herself, about the jealousy though. There was no way, however, that she was letting him know that. He looked slightly crestfallen for a moment but then his face smoothed again so quickly Clary couldn't be sure she hadn't imagined it.  _Stop it_ , she told herself firmly,  _he doesn't care. He doesn't like you, get over it._

"Whatever." He said as though he didn't believe her, though she was pretty sure that he did, the thought made her feel oddly guilty.

"Come on," she touched his arm gently, he flinched slightly but made no move to pull away, "my house is just over there." She nodded in the general direction and began to walk towards it, absentmindedly rubbing her finger-tips together in and attempt to dispel the strange electric tingling in them from touching Jace's skin.

Fifteen minutes later Clary had successfully packed two duffle bags full of clothes and various assorted weapons; Jace had taken one look at the state of Clary's room, shaken his head and gone to wait outside. She stepped out the front door, locking it behind her, and threw one of the bags to Jace, who was sitting on the front steps of Clary's small four bedroom house.

"Carry that."

He rolled his eyes but didn't bother trying to protest. They had just made it to the side-walk when a voice sounded behind them, "Clarissa?"

Clary briefly considered making a run for it, but knowing that it would only come back to bite her later she sighed and turned around.

Her next door neighbour was leaning over the fence dressed in a god-awful purple, raw-silk dress, complete with numerous golden chains around her neck and an equally horrifying turban, Clary didn't think that she followed any particular religion so it must have been for show.

"Yes Madame Dorothea?"

"What are you doing?" the older woman asked suspiciously. Clary waved a dismissive hand, hoping to avoid a lengthy conversation, "Just grabbing some stuff."

"And where are your parents?"

Clary fought to keep the irritation out of her voice, "Mom told you this already Dorothea, they're at the farm."

"And why aren't you with them?"

"Jonathan and I are staying at the New York Institute." Jace made a noise of warning behind her but Clary ignored him, Dorothea knew all about Shadowhunters.

"Come inside, I'll read you fortunes."

"Dorothea we're really-"

Dorothea held her hand up for silence, "Come inside or I'll call your mother and tell her you're wandering around town with a strange Shadowhunter, without your brother I might add, which I'm sure she's forbidden."

Clary sighed in defeat, Dorothea leered and began walking back to her brownstone, "And bring your boyfriend." She called over her shoulder. Clary didn't even bother to correct her, she just shot Jace an apologetic smile and began trudging wearily towards the witch's lair.


	7. Chapter 7

 

Jace grabbed her arm, "How does she know about Shadowhunters? She's not a Downworlder."

Clary shook him off, uncomfortable with the burning sensation his touch caused, "She's the adopted daughter of a warlock, she has the sight and she grew up with our stories."

Jace looked apprehensive, "Is she … safe?"

Clary shrugged, "I have no idea, she's always seemed harmless enough, but maybe she's waiting to jump us the second we walk in the door."

Jace looked considerably more cheerful at the possibility of ensuing violence, "Only one way to find out." He moved off ahead of her.

Dorothea's apartment had been decked out to impress mundane clientele, there were beads hung over all the doorways and sickly sweet incense burning in a holder. There were also zodiac posters and spiritual books strewn everywhere. Dorothea stuck her head through one of the beaded doorways, just in time to see Jace replace the book head been looking at.

"Are you quite done snooping through my things?" she asked waspishly.

Jace met her gaze unapologetically, "Yes."

"Come into the parlour, I'll make tea."

She vanished through the door again and Jace called after her, "Not Earl Gray, I hate bergamot."

Clary shot him a weird look; he was so different from every other boy she'd ever met, except perhaps Jonathan. He opened his mouth to say something, probably to ask why she was staring but she shook her head and led the way into the parlour.

The parlour was a rather dark room filled with taxidermy bats and birds, old and very dusty Persian rugs and a clump of pink armchairs around a small table. Predictably, the table held a glass ball and an assortment of tarot cards as well as a silver tea service. Clary sat in one of the armchairs and Jace threw himself into the next one. Dorothea came bustling over, "How do you like your tea?"

Clary asked for sugar and Jace said he preferred it black, before long they were both holding steaming cups.

"Drink it quick." She muttered to Jace, he shot her an odd look but obliged. Clary took a sip of her own, it was bitter and tasted of smoke. Previous experiences with Dorothea had taught Clary what was coming next, so when the last dregs of tea were left in the cup she swirled it around and tipped it unceremoniously into a dead pot plant by her seat, effectively removing all the tea leaves.

A moment later Jace finished his tea and the cup was snatched from his hand, "Hey!" he cried out indignantly, "What are you doing?"

Dorothea looked at him as though he was stupid, "I'm going to read your tea leaves."

"You're not a real witch!"

She glared at him, "No I am not, but my mother was an excellent fortune teller and she passed some of her tricks onto me."

She turned to the cup and despite herself, Clary leaned forward.

"I see violence in your future, a great deal of blood shed by you and others. You'll fall in love with the wrong person. Also, you'll have an enemy."

Jace leaned back in his chair, "Unfortunately, Lady of the Haven, my one true love remains myself."

Dorothea roared with laughter, "At least," she said, "you don't have to worry about rejection, Jace Herondale."

Jace flinched at the sound of his last name but kept his easy smile in place, "Not necessarily, I turn myself down occasionally just to keep it interesting."

Dorothea laughed again and then turned to Clary, clicking her fingers impatiently for her cup. Clary handed it over, smirking slightly, Dorothea looked down and finding it free of tea leaves made a noise like an angry goose.

"Never mind that Dorothea," she said hastily, "Why did you bring us here?"

"Yes," said Jace, "Why did you bring us to this sanctuary? Because that's what this is isn't it? I'm willing to bet your mother was a control and left this place to you, and that's a portal isn't it?" he nodded to door set in the wall that couldn't have led anywhere, "so when the clave finds whatever criminal you're harbouring they can escape."

Dorothea's expression was unreadable, "You are familiar with the motto of the covenant?"

" _Sed lex dura lex_." Clary muttered.

Jace's eyes flickered to her and then back to Dorothea, "The law is hard but it is the law."

"Well sometimes the law is too hard."

Jace snorted, "You expect me to believe you do this out of the goodness of your own heart? You're not a vigilante fighting for justice and I very much doubt you're a philanthropist."

Dorothea grinned, "It's true we can't all get by on good looks, but in regards to your original question Clarissa, you are here because I have some information for you. I assume you know the story of the original uprising?"

Clary sighed, "My  _father_ ," as always the words burned her throat to say, "led a group of young, promising, Shadowhunters against the Downworlders. He wanted to start a war against them and wipe them out completely, but the other Shadowhunters stood with the Downworlders, and he was defeated."

Dorothea nodded, "And where does your mother fit into this?"

Jace sat up a little straighter, clearly this wasn't a part of the story he'd heard before.

"My mother and Luke were instrumental in Valentine's defeat, she discovered his plans to massacre the unarmed Downworlders at the signing of the accords, what better way to start a war than by killing people at the signing of a peace treaty? Anyway, With Luke's help she spread to word around to be ready, at the signing when his Circle revealed itself they were met with many armed Downworlders who were ready to fight, a far cry from what they had been expecting. They were all either killed or arrested, including Valentine. My mother wasn't there and after the fight was over she presented herself to the Clave with a bargaining chip, Valentine had stolen the Mortal Cup from the Clave and she had stolen it back. She offered it to the them and in return they gave her freedom, she didn't want to be a Shadowhunter anymore, but she didn't let them strip her marks, she would leave Idris but she could come and go as she pleased and they wouldn't keep track of her or interfere in her life. The Clave wasn't happy with her demands but the decided the Mortal Cup was worth it." Clary recited the story she'd grown up with in a long suffering voice, "But I don't understand how this is important."

Dorothea regarded her imperially, "It's important because it's happening again."

Clary felt a dizzying mix of panic and disbelief. Seeing her expression Dorothea huffed in exasperation, "Relax girl, Valentine is well and truly dead."

Jace wasn't nearly as worried as she was, "Are you saying there's another uprising?" he asked sceptically.

Dorothea didn't answer.

"That's impossible! Shadowhunters learned their lesson!"

Dorothea regarded him evenly, unmoved by his outburst, "Perhaps they have," Her voice indicated that she doubted it, "but it's not the Shadowhunters who are rising up."

Clary raised her eyebrows at Jace in a question,  _did you know about this?_  He shook his head.

Dorothea continued, "A group of Downworlders are sick of the tyranny of Shadowhunters and want, among other things, to overthrow you. They call themselves 'The Resistance'."

Jace snorted, "Because that's not at all pretentious."

Dorothea glared coldly at him, "Yes, because 'The Circle' is so unassuming and modest."

Mostly to diffuse the growing animosity Clary said, "Madame Dorothea, you said overthrowing Shadowhunters wasn't all they wanted."

Dorothea looked suddenly uncomfortable, "There is talk that they believe that death was too good for Valentine." Her gaze rested apologetically on Clary, "They are calling for his children to suffer for his crimes."

Jace stood abruptly, no longer looking unconcerned, he grabbed Clary's arm, pulling her up with him, "We need to talk to Hodge,  _Now_."


	8. Chapter 8

 

By the time they left Dorothea's it was dark, Jace hurried along ahead of Clary, his strides so big she had to jog to keep up. They were only a block or so from the subway station when Jace stopped, so suddenly only Clary's Shadowhunter training kept her from crashing into his back.

"What are you-"

He held up his hand, cutting off her question. "Did you hear that?"

"What?" she whispered

"Listen."

A soft, inhuman growling noise came from the alley they had stopped in front of, Clary tried to identify the creature making it was swallowed by darkness. By some unspoken agreement both she and Jace moved towards the sound to investigate. They stepped into the darkness, their eyes adjusting slowly to the gloom. Eventually Clary caught sight of an indistinct shape at the end of the alley, two looming forms of slightly denser darkness, but it was enough to identify them by; obviously canine in origin, too wolf-like to be dogs and too large to be wolves.

"Werewolves." muttered Jace, voicing her thoughts. The low growls rose to menacing snarls. He exchanged the seraph blade in his hand for a silver dagger. Clary's own dagger was already in her hand, seemingly appearing there of its own volition the second she sensed danger. Normally, Clary would not resort to violence the moment she was confronted with Downworlders, Shadowhunters had upheld the accords for years and she would never break them, as if she needed to give people more opportunities to compare her to her father. Not to mention the fact that her kind-hearted nature and peculiar upbringing gave her plenty of reason to actually  _like_  Downworlders, as opposed to the uneasy acceptance that was most Shadowhunter's stance. But in this instance all Clary's instincts were screaming  _DANGER!_  And she'd long since learned to trust her instincts. Or maybe it was just Dorothea's warning setting her on edge,  _a Downworlder uprising_ , either way; Clary was not going to be lowering her weapon anytime soon.

The werewolves began to pad toward them, Jace raised his dagger, "Stop and identify yourselves."

They stopped but the harsh noises they were making changed, sounding all of a sudden, disturbingly like laughter. Exactly what was funny became apparent a moment later, from behind Clary came the whisper-like sounds of graceful bodies falling through the air. She spun around, and cold horror settled in her veins, standing behind them and completely blocking any kind of escape attempt, were five vampires, their skin so pale it seemed to glow in the streetlight they were silhouetted against.

"So…" Clary tried for casual, "This is a trap then."

Jace shifted next to her, trying to keep both enemy groups insight, "It would appear so."

Clary shivered, it wasn't the Downworlders themselves that had her so scared, nor was it the numbers, Shadowhunters were almost always outnumbered and she barely noticed the discrepancies anymore. No. What made her want to curl into a ball and scream was the complete and utter wrongness of the situation, vampires and werewolves never worked together, ever. Their species' had an age-old grudge against each other that constantly sparked minor skirmishes and often escalated into all-out wars. And yet here they were, clearly collaborating. Jace raised his voice, "What do you want?" They vampires leered, the one in front raising his hand to point. Directly at Clary.

"Yeah that's not happening." Jace muttered and in a synchronised movement that they probably couldn't have recreated if they tried; they spun and buried their daggers into the hearts of the werewolves who had been silently creeping closer during their distraction. Jace pulled a new one from his seemingly limitless supply of weaponry but as all Clary's other weapons were still in the duffle bags she'd dropped at the alley's entrance when they'd first heard the growling, she had no choice but to retrieve her dagger from the body of the werewolf she'd thrown it at, leaving Jace to take on all five vampires until she was armed. He didn't seem to mind though, in fact, as he turned Clary thought she saw him smiling.

Battle calm had overtaken her as soon as the fight broke out but her stomach still turned as she approached the werewolves' bodies, which were slowly and horrifically reverting to human form. Clary removed her dagger and turned, just in time to impale the heart of the vampire who had evaded Jace and lunged at her from behind. He gave a soft moan and slumped to the ground but Clary was already stepping over him. Jace was also on the ground, he'd killed one, but a vampire girl had taken him by surprise and was straddling him, her fangs inches from his face, Clary sprang forward, her dagger poised for a killing blow but a the last second cold hands grabbed her and jerked her back. What should have been a blow to the heart fell instead on the girl's neck, spraying vampire blood all over Jace's face. He pressed his advantage and drove his dagger into the vampire girl's heart, cutting off her screams. Meanwhile the hands that had grabbed Clary cast her dagger from her grasp then slid across her throat, not hard enough to construct her airways but enough that the threat was evident. Clary had the uneasy feeling of being pressed against an animate individual, yet feeling no breaths or heartbeat, it was unsettling. Jace stood up and took stock of the situation, Clary's captor spoke, "Let me take the girl or I will kill her in front of you." She couldn't help but grin. People were always underestimating her, it never ended well for them. Her elbow snaked out, catching the man in the nose, he gasped in pain and let her go, she ducked, trusting Jace to do the rest. Jace leapt forward and impaled Clary's would-be-kidnapper with one precision move. Clary stood up and surveyed Jace, he looked fresh off the set of a horror movie with half his face covered in blood. She walked to the bags and dug around until she found an old T-shirt then walked back to him and began wiping the blood from his face. He startled a bit at her touch but made no move to stop her, after a moment she spoke in a resigned voice, "Did you get any in your mouth?"

He sighed and nodded, then his gaze turned accusatory, "Which is totally your fault by the way."

Clary rolled her eyes, "Oh gosh Jace, I'm so sorry the vampire I saved you from bled on you when I stabbed it."

He adopted a superior air, "As you should be." but there was a smile playing on his lips. Clary finished shortly after, her fingers lingering on his face a moment longer than necessary, she suddenly became aware of how close they were standing, close enough that they were sharing breaths. She wanted to close the gap, press her lips to his and run her fingers through his hair, but then a memory rose, unbidden to the surface of her mind, the girls from the subway train and their complete conviction in Clary's inadequacy, she took a painful step back, putting more distance between her and Jace.

Her tone was surprisingly steady when she spoke next, "Most of the blood's gone but you're still going to need a glamour, otherwise you'll draw too much attention."

He raised an eyebrow, "Look at me! I'm gorgeous, when don't I draw attention?"

Clary smiled sweetly, "You're not too gorgeous right now, pretty boy, in fact you're looking distinctly horror movie-ish."

Jace glared at her indignantly, "Pretty boy?"

Clary shrugged and moved to retrieve the bags, "Let's get out of here, come on  _prett_ _y boy_."


	9. Chapter 9

Church was waiting for them when they got back to the Institute, as they stepped out of the elevator his yellow eyes fixed balefully on them, Clary was willing to bet they were in trouble. "Take us to Hodge." Jace told the cat, a slightly tentative note to his voice, as though he, like Clary fancied that the blue Persian was glaring at them. Church stalked off and they followed, Clary dropping back a little ways and watching with a bemused sort of affection as Jace conversed with the cat. She wondered briefly what cats liked to talk about, but perhaps it was best not knowing.

Maybe Jace was being given the silent treatment though, because after a while it became apparent that Church  _did_ resent them for their tardiness, as he had led them on a gigantic round-about tour of the Institute and still hadn't taken them to where they needed to go. Jace it seemed, had noticed as well, "You backstabbing Judas! Do you actually know where he is or are you just wasting our time? Take. Us. To. Hodge! And no detours!" Church huffed and slinked away, Jace and Clary following with slightly more trepidation than before.

They were led to the library and by the sound of the voices coming through the slightly open door Hodge wasn't the only one in there.

She identified Jonathan's voice first, "They've been gone for hours, we have to do something!"

"Jace can handle-" That was Isabelle.

Jonathan cut her off, "I don't give a crap about Jace, but if something's happened to Clary…"

They stepped into the room and all conversation stalled, Jace clasped his hand over his heart in mock hurt, "Jonathan I am wounded, I thought you cared!"

Jonathan ignored him, almost running to Clary and pulling her into a bone-crushing hug. Then he pulled back, he surveyed the state of her and his eyes hardened, "Why are you covered in blood?"

"Am not! It's just a couple spots!"

"You were supposed to be back hours ago!"

"No specific time-frame was given-"

"What the hell happened?"

"It's kind of a long story-"

Jonathan turned to Jace accusingly, "What did you do?"

Jace opened his mouth angrily to reply but Clary cut him off, "Jace!"

He closed his mouth and Clary turned back to Jonathan, "We're going to tell you what happened but first you need to calm down, take some deep breaths, do some yoga or something because we can't tell you if you won't even let us finish a sentence!"

Jonathan stepped back and Clary looked around at everyone else, Hodge was sitting at his desk, waiting patiently for their explanation, Isabelle was casually browsing a bookshelf as if to prove she hadn't been worried, which as far as Clary was concerned meant she had been. Alec was sitting in the armchair Jace had occupied earlier.

Clary took a moment to study him, the last time she'd seen him she'd been lying on the floor of a warehouse, filled to the brim with demon poison. The resemblance between him and his sister was astounding, Clary felt a small pang of jealousy, she and Jonathan had never looked much alike. They shared their mother's artist hands, despite the fact that Jonathan couldn't draw a straight line with a ruler, and there was something of their father in both siblings' jaw-lines, but their most striking resemblance was their eyes, which were the exact same shade of emerald green. As far as likenesses went it wasn't much.

They looked just like their parents, Clary like their mother and Jonathan with his nearly-white-blonde hair, striking features and tall, muscular physique, could have been Valentine reincarnated. It was the eyes that made all the difference, Valentine's eyes had been so dark they were nearly black, Jonathan's green ones softened the angles and lines of his face, which alleviated the distant, cruel look that was conveyed by Valentine's features and made him far more hansom than Valentine had ever been. But as a result of their lack of similarities Clary and Jonathan were sometimes mistaken as a couple, it never failed to ruin an outing. She doubted Alec and Isabelle had ever had that problem, studying Alec now, Clary could see only one significant difference between the two, Isabelle was confident, beautiful and outlandish, everything she did seemingly calculated to capture and hold the attention of those around her. Alec on the other hand, seemed to slump in on himself as though he was desperately trying not to get noticed. And he didn't seem to expect to be noticed either. Clary supposed, that between Jace and Isabelle people wouldn't have much time for Alec, it was a sad thought. At that moment Alec looked up and seeing her studying him gave her a small smile then nodded pointedly at Jace as though to remind her she should be paying attention, she blushed slightly and refocused.

Jace was telling them about their visit to Dorothea's and the subsequent Downworlder attack, Jonathan had thrown his arm around Clary at the beginning of the story and it tightened painfully around her as Jace told how the vampires had wanted her specifically. Thinking of vampires made Clary remember something, "Jace got vampire blood in his mouth!" she piped up.

Jace glared at her, "Traitor."

Clary shrugged, "Would you prefer we left it alone until you were compelled to wander into a vampire's lair?"

Jace was about to reply but Alec cut him off, "Really Jace? Again? You didn't bite it this time did you?"

Jace looked affronted, "That was  _one_  time!"

Hodge spoke before and argument could break out, "This is very troubling news," and indeed he had gone a sickly grey colour, "Jace go to the Infirmary."

Jace glared at them all one last time, then left, slamming the door behind him.

Hodge sighed, "Someone will have to take him the holy water."

"I nominate Clary to do it!" Isabelle cried quickly.

"I second that!" said Alec a moment later.

Clary looked around, confused, "Why?"

Isabelle grinned at her, "He's awful, it puts him in a terrible mood, you have to stay with him and make sure he drinks it, Alec and I have both done it before and we feel our guests should pull their weight."

Alec stepped forward and clapped her on the back, his smile equal parts amusement and sympathy, "You'll be fine, I'll go get the holy water for you."

He disappeared through the door. Hodge cleared his throat, "All right the rest of you clear out, I need to notify the Clave and Maryse and Robert." They all filed out, as soon as the door closed behind them Isabelle grabbed Jonathan's arm and began leading him away, "Good luck Clary," she called over her shoulder, "You're going to need it."


	10. Chapter 10

Clary pushed the door to the Infirmary opened tentatively, trying not to spill any of the Holy water from the gigantic jug Alec had given her. Jace was standing on the other side of the room and didn't turn around when she came in.

"So," he said, "who's drawn the short straw this time?"

Clary took a deep breath, "Me."

Jace spun around and the expression on his face was almost comical, he looked so nonplussed. "Why you?" Clary tried not to get upset, 'why you?' sounded pretty close to 'I don't want you' as far as she was concerned. Jace was still waiting for an answer, Clary scowled at him, "I was nominated, no one else wanted to do it, apparently you're a gigantic pain in the arse, of course, I already knew that."

He glared to her for a moment then flopped down on a bed, "Come here then, let's get this over with."

Clary stalled in shock as his words registered, Isabelle and Alec had made it sound like this was nearly impossible, she'd expected him to throw a tantrum at the very least, what she hadn't expected was for him to give in the second she walked through the door.

"O-okay." She stammered, she set the jug down on the bedside table then poured some of it into a glass. Jace glared at it for a moment as though it had personally offended him and then he grabbed it and drank it. They continued like that for a while, until Clary couldn't stand the silence any longer.

"I have to ask, you bit a vampire?"

The ghost of a smile touched Jace's lips, "He never saw it coming."

"Probably because it's a really terrible idea."

He shot a half-hearted glare in her direction, "No-way Clary, I still maintain that this is  _your_ fault, you  _have_  to be nice to me."

She tried to glare back but a smile broke through, "Oh do I now? If it weren't for me, you wouldn't be a darkling right now, you'd be dinner."

"Would not."

"Oh? Were you going to bite her back?" Clary laughed and Jace glared, which only made her laugh harder.

He didn't answer, Clary looked at him worriedly, his eyes were glassy and his skin flushed with fever, which meant the holy water had begun to do its job. He'd drunk all of it by now which meant it was racing through his system, finding the vampire blood and purging it. Jace's eyes closed and Clary reached out to rest the back of her hand on his forehead, checking his temperature. She jerked it away immediately with a small yelp, "Poor baby, you're burning up." She crooned, only realising who she was talking to a second after the words left her lips. She waited for a derisive comment, but it never came, his lips just curled slightly.

He had nice lips, they looked very soft,  _stop staring_ she thought sternly to herself. She got up, grabbed the jug and began to move away.

"Don't leave!" Clary looked around, Jace's eyes were open now and he was staring at her pleadingly. She smiled slightly, "I'm not, I'm just getting a cloth and some water, I need to get your temperature down."

Once she found the necessary items she traipsed her way back to Jace's bed. She set the jug down on the bedside table once again and after wetting the cloth applied it to Jace's forehead. He gave a slight moan and she grinned, "Better?" he nodded.

"Tell me something about yourself Clary." It came out as little more than a murmur but she heard him. She studied the runes on his skin wondering what to say, after a moment she landed on something.

"My first ever rune, besides the ones we get as babies, was an  _iratze_."

Even with his eyes closed he managed to look confused, "Why?"

Clary smiled slightly at the memory, "I was eight and Jonathan and I were in Idris, remember that I said we were allowed to come and go? Well, we went a few times to visit our Grandparents and later Aunt Amatis, mom never came though, too many memories. Anyway one day Jonathan and I were exploring Lake Lyn-"

"Always a bad idea." Jace interrupted.

"Exactly, I fell in, you know how poisonous that water is to Shadowhunters, it was get the rune or die. It hurt like hell, I cried for hours, but overall it didn't do anything terrible to me, which is a miracle in itself since I was so young. After that our Grandparents and Amatis just portaled to Luke's farm to meet us, we haven't stepped foot in Idris since."

Jace's eye remained closed, and she wondered if he'd fallen asleep, she re-wet the cloth and applied it, once again, to his forehead, he spoke quietly, "Shouldn't you be wearing a nurses' uniform for this?"

Clary rolled her eyes and exclaimed in mock horror, "Oh by the Angel! I knew I forgot something! I can't believe I left my nurses' outfit at home!"

"I can't believe it either, still, there's always next time right?"

Clary laughed, "At least  _try_  to pretend this won't happen again!"

They continued like that for a while, light banter and stories. Clary stayed with Jace until his fever broke and he fell asleep.

She got up stiffly and tiptoed to the door. Once outside Clary realised she had no idea where her room was, luckily for her she'd only gone a few steps down the hall when she ran into Isabelle.

"I'm glad I found you! Do you know where I'm sleeping?"

"Oh! Umm… of course, this way." Isabelle turned and Clary fell into step beside the taller girl.

After a few moments of companionable silence Isabelle spoke, "So, how's Jace?"

"He's sleeping."

The other girl raised an eyebrow, "So you didn't have to strangle him then?"

"No, he was fine."

She grinned, "Clary, I'm his sister, you can complain about him to me."

Clary shook her head, "No really, he was fine."

Isabelle stared at her for a moment, "You're actually telling the truth aren't you? Last time I had to do it he threw the jug at me!"

The walked the rest of the way in silence but Clary could see Isabelle shooting her funny looks out of the corner of her eye.

After a while they stopped, "This is your room." Isabelle was still staring at her and it was making Clary self-conscious. "Thanks, good night." She pushed the door open and stepped inside, too preoccupied by Isabelle's strange reaction to worry about conventional politeness. She looked around, it was a small bedroom furnished with dark wood. Sitting on the floor at the foot of the bed was one of the duffle bags she'd bought from home, the other was presumably with Jonathan. She fell on it gratefully, pulling out a pair of pyjamas and changing quickly. It had been an exhaustingly long day and all she wanted to do was sleep. But then she caught sight of a small rectangular object in the pocket of her jeans, her phone. She pulled it out, it was off.

"Dammit." She cursed, pressing the power button, it came to life and she groaned, six missed calls from her mother, six! Well, she'd have to face Jocelyn eventually, so cringing slightly at the lecture that she was sure was incoming she called her mother back.

Jocelyn picked up on the second ring, "Clary! What's going on? I've been trying to call you, I told you I'd be calling every night!"

Clary sighed, "I'm sorry mom, my phone was turned off and I forgot!  _Which was true._ "

"Alright honey, what did you do today?"

Clary was surprised by how easily her mother had backed down, Jonathan must have placated her when she called him, Clary owed him big time. "Nothing much _. Less true._ "

She cast around for something to say, "I had a tour of the Institute,  _before you left this morning_ ; I talked to Hodge,  _for about ten minutes_ ; and I helped out in the Infirmary,  _after fighting a bunch of Downworlders_."

"That's nice honey, I hope you're having fun! Your Aunt Amatis and your Grandparents wished you a happy birthday, do you want to talk to them?"

Clary groaned, "Can I talk to them tomorrow night? I'm really tired."

"Okay, I love you."

"I love you too, can you give my love to everyone else?"

"Of course, talk to you tomorrow."

"Bye mom."

"Bye Clary."

Clary hung up and dropped the phone onto her bedside table, then she climbed into the bed, it was warm and soft and incredibly comfortable, she was asleep before her head hit the pillow.


	11. Chapter 11

Clary was having a nice dream, she was in a park with an attractive boy, he was smiling at her and his eyes were so gold-

She was jerked rudely away from the pleasant scene by a hand on her shoulder, she cried out and her Shadowhunter training took over. Before she was even fully awake she'd sat up, the dagger she'd placed under her pillow the night before already in her hand, and slashed wildly at the indistinct figure sitting on her bed. It gave a masculine cry of indignation and clamped a strong, calloused hand over her wrist, preventing further attacks. After a moment her would-be victim came into focus, it was Jace.

"You tried to stab me." He said accusingly.

There was barely any light in the room, "What time is it?" asked Clary dumbly.

He shrugged, "Five-ish."

"In the morning?" her voice shot up a few octaves with her outrage, "I wish I  _had_  stabbed you!"

"I told you not to wake her up." Jonathan was standing in the doorway, looking completely alert and very amused. Jace glared at him, "You told me she'd be grumpy, you didn't tell me she'd try to impale innocent bystanders!"

Clary glared at him, jerking her wrist from the loose grip he still maintained on it, "As far as I'm concerned anyone who wakes someone up at  _five in the morning_  could never be considered innocent!"

He shook his head at her, "I thought you had shadowhunter training, we all wake up this early, your brother did."

Jonathan laughed, Clary glared at him, he was enjoying this too much. "Yeah, the one thing mom actually wants us to take away from training and Clary refuses to learn, you should see the ordeal we have to go through to get her up at eight to get ready for school."

Jace snorted, "You go to  _school_? As in  _Mundane school_?"

"Well not right now, it's holidays, but yes, what else would we do all day?" Clary reasoned.

Jace rolled his eyes, "What every other Shadowhunter in the history of the world does, train."

"Mom and Luke have mundane jobs, there isn't anyone at home during the day."

He looked like he was about to say something else, but changed tack at the last moment, "So what's school like?"

Clary rolled her eyes, "Hideously boring, I like art class though."

"What kind of stuff do you learn?"

"We learn a lot about mundane history, mathematics, English. The fun stuff." She screwed her nose up.

Jonathan cleared his throat, Clary jumped and sat back, she hadn't realised how close they'd been leaning toward one another. Jace stood "Right, get ready quick."

"Right," she said in the same carefully controlled voice, "Get out."

For a moment Jace stared at her in bewilderment and hurt, and then Jonathan spoke up, "She needs to get changed." His tone was light but the glare he was giving Jace conveyed an obvious warning.

Both boys stepped out of the room, closing the door behind them.

Ten minutes later Clary stepped out after them, freshly showered and wearing yet another jeans-and-singlet ensemble. Jace glanced at her, "Took you long enough."

Jonathan snorted, "For Clary that was incredibly fast." She kicked him in the shin then turned to Jace, "So, you'd better have a good reason to get me up at this ungodly hour."

He gave her a devilish grin that made her heart race, "Of course, we're going to train, time to see what you're made of Morgenstern."

Clary had to admit, the training room was incredible, sparring dummies and targets lined the walls, with plenty of space cleared in the middle for hand to hand combat, and ladders and planks crisscrossing mid-air for balance practice, she supposed they would have harnesses as well, so they could practice turns, falls and somersaults without the danger of getting hurt. In one corner there were a few benches, which was where Alec and Isabelle were sitting, Clary made to move toward them but Jace snagged her arm, "Sorry Clary, you're with me."

Obviously, he meant sparring, but Clary wondered why he chose her first, was he deliberately trying to stop her from observing his fighting style, or was he curious about her abilities? Maybe he was just looking for instant gratification and figured she'd be an easy target, the latter seemed most likely. But there was no way in hell Clary was going down without a fight; she was going to win this.

They stopped in the centre of the room and faced one another; Clary hadn't seen much of Jace's fighting skills, but enough to know he was an impatient person, someone who liked things happening, and someone who would make the first move. Sure enough, as soon as Isabelle called go, there was no circling or sizing up, Jace just lunged. But Clary had lived sixteen years of having only one sparring partner, Jonathan, it had taught her a thing or two. She could tell by Jace's eyes that he'd expected this fight to end quickly, she'd wager they usually did. You never knew just how fast someone was until you faced them yourselves, his speed would catch most opponents off-guard and the fight would be over before it began; but Clary wasn't most opponents. When Isabelle had yelled go, Clary had moved too, a quick sidestep that bought her out of range of Jace's attack. Encountering no resistance from her he stumbled, making it all too easy for the round-house kick Clary sent his way to send him to the floor. He was up almost instantly and for a while they traded blows, Jace's surprise at being bested, however temporarily, gave Clary the upper hand for a short time, but he was quickly regaining his rhythm. When she was mere minutes away from being taken down Clary decided it was time for another unexpected move. She grinned at Jace then turned and ran. It was such a random and senseless thing to do, that for a moment Jace just stood there and watched, which was all the head start she needed. She threw herself at one of the ladders, climbing to one of the higher-most balance beams. Once she reached the top she barely had time to turn before Jace was on her again, instantly she realised her mistake. This was Jace's element, he'd probably been training on these things since he could walk, not to mention the fact that if he did fall off he'd probably be fine, Clary on the other hand? Not so much. She needed to get her feet back on the ground. She risked a glance down, a few metres below was another beam, exactly what she needed. Clary stepped neatly off the beam she was standing on but only fell for a second before she came to a jarring halt, hanging in mid-air. Jace had reached out and caught the back of her shirt, he was kneeling on the beam and Clary had seconds at best before he pulled her back up and then it would all be over.

She pressed her fingertips against the material of her shirt, already strained by the combined force of gravity and her own weight; then she dug them in and pulled. The fabric ripped like paper and Clary dropped to the beam below. Jace gave a startled yell as her weight suddenly disappeared from his hand, causing him to overbalance. But she didn't spare him a second thought, she ran lightly along the beam the dropped down to the next one, continuing like that until she reached the last beam. Clary threw herself down those last four metres to the ground, rolling as she hit to absorb the impact of her fall. Then she stood and waited, a second later Jace landed, he's simply jumped from the top beam and her ripped shirt was still clutched in his hand. He turned to her and froze, his eyes widening and a slow blush creeping across his skin, Clary didn't pause to wonder at his distraction, she just attacked.

She swept her leg low, knocking his from underneath him than leaped, straddling him lightly she pressed both fists on his chest in an unmistakable gesture,  _'if I'd had a knife, you'd be dead.'_  She met Jace's eyes, a grin pulling at the corners of her mouth and stalled, his facial expression was not one of a person who'd just been handed a humiliating defeat.

Without the cold, single-mindedness of battle Clary was able to look back over the last few minutes with dawning horror, she'd ripped her shirt; Jace was actually holding it right now, which meant she wasn't wearing a  _shirt_! No boy had ever seen her shirtless before and now here she was, sitting on one, Jace no less, who was the most gorgeous boy she'd ever seen, and who was also, practically a stranger, and she was in her bra. And to make matters worse, his own shirt had ridden up slightly, exposing a band of golden muscle, as if she needed anything to make her blush harder.

A pair of strong hands grabbed her and pulled her up, which she was grateful for, since humiliation appeared to have frozen her joints. Alec and Isabelle were roaring with laugher and when she met Jonathan's gaze, who was of course to one who had rescued her, his lips were curved as well. His expression softened slightly at the look of panic in Clary's eyes, "I thought as much," he shook his head, "you know you're completely insane right?"

He sighed, pulled his shirt off and dragged it down over Clary's head. Isabelle's voice came, in between fits of laugher, "Is there some kind of a stripping game going on that I don't know about?"

Clary's face, if possible, got even redder. Jonathan called back, "No, I just think it's more important that Clary's wearing a shirt than me, you know how teenage boys are, massive pervs." The last line was delivered with a poisonous glare at Jace, Clary just stared stoically at her feet, wishing desperately that glamours worked against Shadowhunters. What she wouldn't give to be invisible right now. Jonathan squeezed her arm, "Maybe you should go and get changed." She nodded and turned, using every ounce of her willpower to stop herself from running from the room, silently contemplating the logistics of fleeing the country.


	12. Chapter 12

Clary had been standing outside the door of the training room for the last ten minutes, trying to work up the courage to go inside. It had only taken her a moment to change clothes, as soon as she'd stepped into her room she'd dug through her bag until she found a long-sleeved shirt with a high neck-line, as though covering as much skin as possible now could somehow counteract how much she had shown before. She'd considered simply hiding in her room but she suspected someone would probably come looking for her and drag her out anyway.

The real clincher however, was that she didn't want Jace to think she was hiding from him, even if that was exactly what she was doing. Now though she couldn't seem to take the last few steps, she'd thought it had taken a lot of will power not to run from the room, but it was going to take a hell of a lot more to walk back in. After a few more moments of teetering uncertainty Clary sighed irritably and stepped forward, it wasn't as though things could get any worse.

As soon as the doors closed Clary couldn't help but scan the room, her eyes fell on him almost instantly, he was in the middle of the room, fighting Jonathan. Her immediate reaction was relief, anything to postpone the moment she would have to talk to him. Her second reaction, following hot on relief's heels, was dismay. Whether it be some macho-man display or simply the stifling heat of the room, the fact remained that Jace, like Jonathan, had removed his shirt. She watched for a moment of awed fascination as the muscles of his perfectly tanned chest flexed attractively, some part of her brain was drooling, but mostly she was focused on her renewed sense of inadequacy, the contrast between her and Jace didn't even bare thinking about. She tore her eyes away from him and turned to the benches where Alec and Isabelle sat.

When she sat down Alec gave her a reassuring sort of a smile and Isabelle, clearly also attempting to be comforting said, "I really wouldn't worry about it. I doubt you're the first girl to straddle Jace while half-naked." Clary cringed, half-naked was not a phrase she liked at the moment _._  Alec shot Isabelle a glare, "That's not helpful."

He turned to Clary, "Ignore her, she has no social skills, you should be very proud of yourself, there are very few people in the world who can claim to have beaten Jace in a fight."

Clary felt a glow of pride but her own practicalities quashed it, "It kind of feels like I cheated." Isabelle snorted but Alec continued to regard her steadily, "You fought with your head, and you were really good, most people go down in the first couple seconds, besides, maybe you should feel privileged by Jace's preoccupation, the number of people who can claim to have distracted him during a fight is nearly as small as the number of people who have beaten him." He could have meant that it was rare to catch Jace on a day of low concentration, but it sounded more intimate to Clary, as though she was special, that thought, more than Isabelle's jokes and Alec's praise allowed her to relax enough to turn her attention to the match in the middle of the room.

It was the most incredible fight Clary had ever seen, Jace and Jonathan were moving so fast they seemed to blur, twisting and kicking and jumping and flipping as though they were locked in a beautiful and shockingly brutal dance. In speed, strength and skill they looked evenly matched, but even as she watched Clary could see the distinction beginning to show, Jonathan, easily the more level-headed of the two, had learned Jace's style and was beginning to combat it. Which only drove Jace to even greater lengths, the fight, if possible, got even more vicious, nearly every blow was now drawing blood and neither looked even close to being done. Isabelle sighed and stood up, "I'm going to go break that up before they kill each other, plus I don't think Jace's ego could stand losing twice in one day." She walked towards them and after a few minutes of shouting they nodded and stepped away from each other, Isabelle immediately claimed Jonathan's attention and Jace turned and began walking towards the benches, toward  _Clary_.

Short of getting up and running from the room she had no escape, she really wished Jace would change his mind and go somewhere else, or at the very least put on a shirt, but at this point neither looked likely. He sat down next to her and she couldn't help but stare, there was blood in his hair and skin was mottled with bruises and yet, despite all that, he was still outrageously attractive. It wasn't fair.

"You look terrible." She reached for his arm and applied an  _iratze_ , he sighed in relief then nodded toward the combat space in the middle of the room, "Were you watching?" Her eyes followed his, Isabelle and Jonathan were engaged in a half-hearted wrestling match which quickly dissolved into a make-out session, Clary wished they wouldn't, despite the other girls abrasiveness Clary rather liked Isabelle, and wasn't particularly enjoying seeing her ravaged by her brother.

Clary tore her eyes away, some things should be left unseen, "I assume you mean your fight, as opposed to the atrocity currently being performed?"

He grinned wryly and nodded, Clary couldn't help but smile back, "It was incredible, I've been sparring with Jonathan pretty much since I could walk, but until today I had no idea how much he'd been holding back." She wanted to say something about how amazing Jace was, but even in her head it sounded pathetically awed, so she stayed quiet. Jace looked as though her answer disappointed him somehow but he nodded, "I've always been able to move like that but I have no idea how."

Clary looked sharply at him, he was telling the truth, he had no idea what had happened to him. She should tell him, it was the right thing to do, but still she held back, it was a secret she'd kept carefully for years. The number of people who knew could be counted on one hand. Even in the face of someone who deserved to know, a life-time of keeping secrets made her hesitate. And the worst thing was, that wasn't even the real reason she couldn't seem to open her mouth, she was afraid, afraid that he would finally hate her, and selfish as it was, she wanted him without complications a little while longer. Her phone buzzed, breaking her from her reverie, she read the message quickly and nearly sighed in relief. She'd just been handed the perfect get-out-of-jail-free card and as wrong as it was, she was going to take it. She stood up, shooting a distracted sort of smile at Jace, "I have to do something." She indicated her phone, "be back soon." She hurried from the room, trying not to drown in her guilt.


	13. Chapter 13

Jace watched as Clary jumped up as if she'd been stung and hurried from the room, he couldn't help wondering morosely if it was because of him. She fascinated him, more so than any other girl he'd ever met, which, if he was honest, wasn't saying much. He rarely even found them interesting. He'd always been able to read people like a book, and pretty girls had always been particularly transparent to him; but Clary was different. For one thing she wasn't just pretty, she was beautiful, which was not a term Jace applied lightly, and for another she was a complete mystery. She was surrounded by a mass of secrets and lies so dense it made her hard to see, every time he managed to coax the truth from her all it seemed to do was illuminate more mysteries, he'd find it frustrating if it weren't so damn enticing. He'd spent nearly every waking moment with her since they met and he still didn't even know if she liked him as a person, let alone in any other capacity.

And then there was the fight. Jace had never frozen before, not once, but when he saw her standing there his mind had gone blank of everything but her, she could've killed him and he doubted he'd have made a move to stop her. And then when she was sitting atop him with an expression not dissimilar to one of a sleepwalker waking up in an unfamiliar and scary place, he'd wanted to kiss her so badly it was like a physical ache. A male sigh sounded from somewhere behind him and Jace nearly jumped out of his skin, he'd forgotten Alec was sitting there.

"For God's sake Jace just go after her, you're not fooling anyone!" His  _parabatai_  was glaring at him with a mixture of irritation and amusement. Jace opened his mouth for a denial, closed it again, then sighed resignedly, got up and followed Clary.

She was harder to find then he would've thought, he checked all the most obvious rooms and she wasn't in any of them. Then an idea occurred to him, maybe she'd gone outside, she could've got a phone message to meet someone, it would explain her abrupt departure.

When he reached the front door it was hanging open and Clary was standing on the sidewalk talking to a boy. Jace's first thought was that he was her boyfriend. He warred for a moment with the strangely conflicting emotions of despair and possessive jealousy. Then he noticed another girl standing there, holding hands with the boy. Which made it extremely unlikely that he was dating Clary, though that still didn't completely expunge Jace's feelings, ridiculous as they were. He didn't go outside, he just stood unobtrusively in the doorway watching.

The other two were werewolves, but it clearly wasn't any kind of business interaction, they were chatting and laughing like old friends. Jace couldn't help but marvel at Clary's way of life, there were very few Shadowhunters who could honestly count Downworlders among their friends.

Soon after, the trio said good-bye with hugs all around, the werewolves began walking hand-in-hand down the street and Clary turned back towards the Institute. Jace wasn't fast enough to move and she saw him.

"Jace? What are you doing here?" she stopped in front of him. He shrugged and changed the subject, "Who were they?" he asked nodding towards the two retreating figures.

"They're friends of mine, Maia goes to school with me, she's in most of my classes, and that was her boyfriend Jordan."

"What were they doing here?"

Clary rolled her eyes, "They claimed they were 'in the neighbourhood' and decided to drop by. But Luke is close with their pack and Maia works part time for him, he obviously called in a favour to have me checked up on, they'll probably be 'in the neighbourhood' again tomorrow. You'll notice no one is keeping tabs on Jonathan." She crossed her arms and scowled, the model of a disgruntled teenager.

"Can I umm…" she indicated coming inside.

"Oh, yeah sorry."

She made to step passed him at the same moment Jace moved to get out of her way, and instead they crashed into each other. It would have been so easy, just to step back and out of the way, but how could he not kiss her, when she was standing this close? So instead of doing the smart thing, the safe thing, and moving away, he moved closer, his lip crashing into hers.

She stiffened, and for one heart-stopping moment Jace thought she was going to pull away but then she relaxed and was as much in it as him. Some tiny, rational part of his brain was screaming at him to stop, to think about what he was doing, this girl could ruin him. But it was a small part and so easily disabled by the slide of Clary's tongue across his lips. And then all of him was screaming something else entirely, he should never, ever stop kissing Clary, it was incredible. She was a sensory overload and he was drunk on the softness of her lips, the way she smelt. Her fingers were wound tightly through his hair, and though countless other girls had done it before her it had never felt like this, as though all his nerve endings were firing at once. Everywhere she touched him burned, like her very presence was raising his internal temperature. He bit her lip softly and a shiver reverberated through her body. One of his hands clasped her lower back, holding her tight, the other twisted though her hair, entwining it so much he doubted he could have removed it if he wanted too, and he sure as hell didn't want to.

Eventually though, practicalities forced some level of separation on them, namely, oxygen or lack thereof. Neither moved to step away from each other though, they remained in a tangled embrace, chests heaving, standing so close that Jace could feel Clary's heart racing, he didn't think too much of it though, because he was sure she could also feel his. He looked at her face, her eyes were wide and her lips were slightly swollen from kissing.

She also looked vaguely shell shocked, as though she wasn't entirely sure what had just happened. He opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted by the tell-tale sounds of the elevator. He sighed irritably and disentangled himself from Clary, moving to close the Institute's doors. By the time he'd slid the last bolt home the elevator had opened to reveal Jonathan. He leant casually against the back wall of the elevator, his expression hardening as he took in their swollen mouths and dishevelled hair, "Hodge wants to talk to us." He addressed Clary, and then his gaze fell threateningly on Jace, "All of us."

Clary glanced apologetically at Jace then led the way between the pews of the cathedral to the elevator and Jonathan. As soon as they stepped inside Jonathan placed himself between them like a physical barrier and pressed the button aggressively. When the doors slid open again at the foyer, he grabbed Clary's arm and dragged her away down the hall, but Jace could still here their conversation.

"Seriously Clary? Your lack of self-control is appalling!"

They walked further down the hall, seemingly forgetting that Jace was behind them. Clary's reply came almost too quiet to hear, "I only have one thing to say to you Jonathan;  _Isabelle_ , you filthy hypocrite!"

All in all, perhaps it was better they'd forgotten about Jace, they seemed to be settling in for a major dispute.


	14. Chapter 14

Even the after-glow of Jace's kisses was not enough to lighten what Hodge had to tell them. Everyone gathered in the library, crowding around his desk, Jonathan asked the question on everyone's minds, "Is this about 'The Resistance'?" His tone held a mocking edge as he uttered the groups' name, but no one smiled.

Hodge sighed, "Unfortunately not. I've talked to the Clave, the number of Downworlder attacks is on the rise but everyone is turning a blind eye, no one wants the Accords to be broken, it would mean war, and with the way Downworlder numbers have risen over the years it's a war we may not win."

At that everyone became very pale and Jonathan spoke up angrily, "So their solution is just to stand by and let them have free reign?"

"You know how the Clave work, they're not going to act without irrefutable evidence."

"A testimony is irrefutable evidence! Dorothea may be a mundane but she's part of the Shadoworld!"

Hodge's hands clenched, "But that's the thing! There  _are_  no testimony's! Apart from Jace and Clary who are sixteen and therefore unlikely to be taken seriously, no Shadowhunter has ever seen the group in action! And no Downworlder is going to come forward, any of them that haven't joined 'The Resistance' are keeping their heads down and staying the hell out of the way!"

"I'm nearly seventeen!" muttered Jace reproachfully.

Hodge glared at him, "You know as well as I do that until you turn eighteen you're not an adult. No one is going to start a war on the word of a child."

Jace glared back and Hodge's shoulders slumped, as if all the fight had gone from him, "I know you're not a child Jace," he said quietly, "But you know I'm right."

For the first time since she'd walked into the room Clary spoke, "Okay, so why are we here?"

Hodge smiled tiredly, "I have a job for you, the number of murders and missing persons in the area around the Alto Bar in Brooklyn has increased exponentially," he screwed up his nose, "drunk mundanes make easy targets. Anyway, reports suggest a group of Eidolon Demons, I need you all to go down there and check it out, kill them if you can. And you have the perfect cover, there's a band playing tonight," he checked his notes, "it's called Lawn-Chair Crisis."

Jace made a chocking sound, "You want us to go listen to a band called  _Lawn-Chair Crisis_?"

Hodge checked his notes again, "Last week it was called Rock Solid Panda."

"And they change their name weekly, this just keeps getting better and better."

Hodge ignored him, "With everything that's going on right now I wouldn't send you unless I thought it was necessary, and obviously I can't come with you, so you will all have to promise to stay together."

Jonathan looked confused, "Why can't you come?"

Clary rolled her eyes, "Honestly Jon! You'd know these things if you paid the slightest bit of attention to mom's history lessons!"

He grinned at her, "I don't  _have_  to pay attention in history, that's what I have you for, my dearest sister."

She glared at him, "Hodge can't leave the Institute because-" She broke off, realising it might be a touchy subject, but Hodge smiled benevolently at her and gestured for her to continue. "The Lightwoods and Hodge were part of fath- Valentine's inner circle, they fought at the final battle but surrendered, the Clave banished them to the New York Institute and cursed Hodge so that he could never leave."

Silence descended on the group, Isabelle and Alec looked particularly grim, it's not nice to be reminded that your parents were once on the wrong side. Though Clary doubted they understood half of what her and Jonathan felt, their father wasn't  _on_  the wrong side, he  _was_ the wrong side.

It was Isabelle who spoke first, "What time does the band play Hodge?"

He looked again at the flyer on his desk, "Eight O'clock."

Isabelle grabbed Jon's wrist and checked his watch, "Excellent, we have two hours until we have to leave."

Clary started in surprise, it was that late already? Where had that day gone?

Isabelle grabbed Clary and began dragging her to the door, "Come on Clary, we'll go to my room, I  _need_  to find you something decent to wear."

Clary tried to pull away, she'd hoped to spend a bit more time with Jace and judging by the frustration on his face he'd been thinking something similar. "Isabelle, there is nothing wrong with my clothes!"

She stopped trying to pull Clary's arm out of its socket and turned to face her instead, giving a critical once-over that made Clary feel instantly self-conscious, "From what I've seen the only thing you own is jeans and T-shirts."

Clary opened her mouth to deny it but since it was true she changed tack, "There's nothing wrong with jeans and T-shirts!"

Isabelle smiled conspiratorially, "There is tonight." And with that Clary was dragged from the room.

Fifteen minutes later Clary was standing in Isabelle's exploded disco ball themed bedroom, wearing one of Isabelle's shirts,  _as a dress._

"I cannot wear this!"

Isabelle glared at her, "Of course you can!"

"I look like a hooker!"

Her frown deepened, "Watch it! Those are my clothes you're wearing!"

"Exactly! I am wearing your  _shirt_! As in, designed to go with pants!"

"You're short, you can pull it off."

She was digging around in her wardrobe, and immerged triumphantly a second later brandishing a pair of stiletto-heeled knee-high boots. Clary stared at them for a moment, unlike her who wouldn't wear a pair of shoes without first putting a soundless rune on them; Isabelle seemed to enjoy the novelty of noisy, inappropriate footwear.

Clary shook her head, "No way Isabelle, we have to fight tonight! I'll break my ankle!"

"You're a Shadowhunter! Don't even try to pretend you can't balance in them!"

"But they're so uncomfortable!" she whined

"I don't care, like I said before, you're short, you need all the help you can get."

Clary glared at her for a moment and then pulled them on, they fit surprisingly well and even had a sheath hidden in them so she wouldn't have to go without her dagger.

Isabelle eyed her appreciatively for a moment and then gestured to the chair in front of her dresser, "Now sit down, I have to do your make-up."

Clary shook her head.

"Clary!" Isabelle's voice had taken on a pleading note, "I've barely had any contact with girls my own age! Are you really going to deny me the opportunity for girly things?"

"I don't do girly things Isabelle!"

She glared, "Either you sit down willingly and let me do your make-up or I tie you to the chair with my whip."

Clary laughed, "The easy way or the hard way huh?"

The other girl fingered her weapon dangerously and Clary decided it might be a good idea just to do as she was told.

Isabelle clapped delightedly as she sat down and immediately pounced with a flurry of brushes.

"So Clary, have you kissed my brother yet?"

Clary looked up quickly; Isabelle's reflection was staring at her shrewdly through the mirror.

"Who?" she asked innocently.

Isabelle rolled her eyes, "Jace of course! I'm hardly talking about Alec he's gay!" she clapped her hand over her mouth too late to stop the sentence from escaping. "You can't tell anyone! You must know what a huge deal that is for Shadowhunters!"

Clary shook her head, "I won't tell, but you know in the mundane world it's not that big a deal. They even hold parades for it."

Isabelle sighed, "I don't think there are any gay Shadowhunter parades in our future," her face twisted in disgust, "they're treated so badly they'd rather fall on their seraph blade than admit to having 'unnatural urges'."

"Does your family know?"

"Jace and I do, I keep trying to convince Alec that our parents would love him no matter what, but the worst thing is I'm not even entirely sure that it's true, and I think he knows it."

They both lapsed into silence for a while then Isabelle dragged them back to their original topic, "I'm going to assume from the way you were blushing before that I was right. Just… don't break his heart okay? He has enough issues as it is."

Clary's mouth hung open, that was not at all what she'd expected, and the very thought that she of all people could break Jace's heart was ridiculous.

Isabelle correctly interpreted her expression, "He treats girls the way normal people treat newspapers, he picks one up, figures her out and then drops her. I've never seen him get so much as a crush on anyone before. You're different. You didn't know him before, so you can't understand how strange it is to see his eyes following someone around the room, you're all he sees."

Clary was speechless, caught between asking Isabelle to repeat the entire thing, especially the last bit, and accusing her of mental instability. There was no way she was  _that_  special. But Isabelle spoke first, "All done!"

Clary looked in the mirror, and did a double take. Her freckles had been obliterated by perfect foundation and a cream-and-roses complexion, her eyes were surrounded by Smokey make-up that bought out the vibrant green in them. Her lips were smudged pale pink. She looked…beautiful.

Isabelle gave a self-congratulatory smile, "You look awesome! Now get up, I need to get ready."


	15. Chapter 15

Simon peeked uncertainly out of the curtain, Alto Bar was unusually crowded, and he had no idea why. It seemed unlikely that all of these people were here to see his crappy band. Erik leaned over his shoulder and whistled, "It's totally packed out," -he never really understood what Simon had, that their band wasn't actually good- "I knew it was only a matter of time, the people love us."

Simon rolled his eyes, he had no idea who 'the people' were and didn't doubt for a second that Erik had no clue either, he may have been Simon's best friend, but he was definitely still an idiot.

"Hey man, isn't that Clary?" Simon scanned the room, sure enough sitting at one of the tables was Clary, she was with her brother –no surprise there; he never left her side- and three other people Simon had never seen before. He withdrew his head quickly before she could catch sight of him.

The rest of the band crowded around, smiling their mocking grins.

"Isn't she that red-head that's in most of your classes?" Kirk inquired.

"Yeah," said Matt, understanding dawning in his eyes, "the one you're in love with!"

Simon blushed, "I am not in love with her!" he insisted, but Erik continued as if he hadn't spoken, "Yeah, I never got that, how can you be in love with someone you don't even speak to?"

"I do speak to her!"

Kirk rolled his eyes, "'Did you understand last nights' homework?' is not a real conversation."

Simon folded his arms and glared "What do  _you_  think I should say to her than?"

"I want to bang you like a drum?" suggested Erik and they all burst out laughing.

After they'd calmed down everyone looked back out the curtain again, she was deep in conversation with the people at her table.

"Wow," muttered Matt, "Who's that other girl she's with? Super-hot!"

Simon eyed him witheringly, "Don't you have a girlfriend?"

He shrugged, "Yes, but that doesn't mean I can't make an objective observation."

"Since when has 'Super-hot' been an objective observation?"

"About as objective as I can get, looking at that."

Erik clapped his hands together, "It doesn't matter who she's with! Simon, go talk to her!"

Simon glared at him, " _I_  think it matters who she's with, I've never seen Jonathan willingly let someone flirt with his sister."

"Shouldn't be a problem, you're not straightforward enough or brave enough to actually flirt with her."

And then Erik, completely ignoring the death glare Simon was sending his way, pushed him out the curtain, "Go!"

He turned and began walking off the stage and as he did, he distinctly heard Kirk say, "You do realise that one of those guys she's with, you know, the ones that look like they could be models, is probably her boyfriend."

"I know," muttered Erik, "but it's about bloody time he got over her."

He nearly turned back but Erik was right, no harm could come from talking to her. He squared his shoulders and set out across the room.

While walking towards Clary's table he was cornered by Maureen, she was the bands biggest fan and with her pale blond hair, small stature ,and wardrobe that looked as if it had been thrown up on by a rainbow, she looked even younger than she actually was, which was unfortunate due to her rather large crush on Simon.

He managed to dodge her by promising to see her after the show and then he kept moving.

Clary looked different, for one thing she was dressed in a way he'd never seen on her before, knee-high stiletto boots which only extenuated how short and tight her dress was, coupled with a leather jacket. The whole outfit was black, in fact, the only spots of colour on her were her pale pink lips, bright green eyes and fiery red hair. She looked totally badass; but that wasn't really the biggest change. At school Clary slumped in on herself, she sat in the corners of rooms and kept quiet, doing everything she could not to draw any attention. Now, however, she sat with a quiet kind of confidence, he's always thought of her as shy and timid. Looking at her now, he realised, she may have been a little shy but she was by no means timid. There was a fierceness about her that he'd never noticed before, a coiled readiness that belayed her relaxed stance. As though she could jump into action at a moment's notice. And though she appeared to be conversing with her companions, her eyes roved constantly around the room, watching everyone. He'd never seen her play much sport, she didn't participate a lot during P.E. and Simon had assumed that she, like him, lacked the co-ordination and enthusiasm for it, but her exposed legs showed off bands of muscle, he wondered why someone would pretend to be bad at sport, but that though was over-shadowed by another, the realisation that he didn't actually know Clary at all.

It occurred to him then, that perhaps he should be afraid of this tiny, mysterious girl, and he was. But the moment passed, and he pushed the feeling aside, it was ridiculous. Simon continued toward their table, still intending to at least talk to her, Clary looked torn between exasperation and anger, she appeared to be arguing with Jonathan, he was trying to convince her to change clothes,

"Clary that dress is so tight it's like a second skin!"

"I didn't choose it!" she protested, "Blame Isabelle!"

The dark-haired girl, the one Matt thought was 'super-hot', narrowed her eyes, "Yes, do blame Isabelle, because she looks great, doesn't she look great Jace?" she turned her attention to the boy with golden hair and eyes, he looked over from where he'd been examining everyone else in the room and met Clary's gaze.

"Yes." He said, and that one syllable contained so much desire and an affection that Simon felt awkward, as though he'd intruded on a private moment, he was about to turn away when Clary broke the eye contact and saw him.

"Simon!" she exclaimed in surprise, "What are you doing here?"

His heart rose a bit that she was talking to him instead of blondie, "I'm part of the band, glad you could make it."

The blond one, Jace, snorted, "Do you really think we're here to listen to your crappy music, mundie? We wouldn't be here were it not for the-"

He cut off midsentence and glared at Clary, whom, as far as Simon could tell, had just kicked his shin under the table. Simon wondered what he'd been about to say, he also thought he'd been called a ' _mundie_ ' it was clearly meant as an insult of some sort but he'd never heard of it before.

"So, in a band Simon, that's pretty cool." Clary continued as though Jace hadn't spoken, but again he interrupted, "Yeah, cool right up until the moment you hear them play."

They were both glaring at each other now but as soon as Clary's gaze slid back to Simon's, Jace's face relaxed, and he was just staring at her, as though she was beautiful or dangerous or both. The other girl, Isabelle, watched him for a moment then exchanged knowing smiles with the dark haired boy, who must have been her brother, if not her twin. Jonathan, for his part, looked as though he couldn't decide if he disapproved or simply found the entire situation highly amusing.

Clary smiled up at Simon and for a moment he though he saw the black outline of a tattoo or a burn on her collar bone but then she shifted slightly and it was gone, so quickly that he couldn't be sure it had been there at all.

"Good luck." She sounded sincere and Simon tried to smile back but it felt forced, the entire encounter had left him feeling utterly confused and more than a little put out, there was no competing with someone like Jace, "Thanks, I'd better go, we're starting soon." He hurried back to his friends.

"Well?" Erik looked up as he approached, "How did it go?"

"Weird." Said Simon truthfully, "I don't know if she's dating any them but I'm pretty sure the blonde one wishes she was."

Erik shrugged, "You should just ask her out, the worst that could happen is she says no."

"I'm pretty sure the worst that could happen is actually Jonathan and  _Jace_ ," he spoke the name like a curse, "teaming up to beat me to a pulp."

"Whatever, help with the instruments, we're on in five."

They set everything up and were stood on stage ready to start, when yet another group of people Simon had never seen before walked in. They were all attractive and young, sporting bright, jewel-coloured eyes that had to be the result of coloured contacts. Their appearance in itself was not nearly as remarkable as Clary's group's reaction to seeing them. Simon doubted anyone else had noticed, but when the strangers walked in Clary and her friends stiffened slightly, only for a second. They went back to normal almost immediately and gave no obvious signs that they had even seen the new arrivals, they certainly didn't look at them, but something told Simon that they were what Jace had been referring to when he spoke of their reason for being here.

Erik broke into Simon's reverie as he counted them in and Simon forcefully pushed Clary and every one of her crazy friends from his mind and began to play.

All in all, they'd been doing quite well, they were on their last song and the crowd appeared to be enjoying themselves, Simon looked up as the song ended, just in time to see the group with the strange eyes get up and leave through the side door, his eyes flicked to Clary, she watched them leave and after a quick conference with her companions the all got up and followed. Simon wondered what was going on, Erik's words echoed in his ears, ' _you should just ask her out'_  he was right, what was the worst that could happen really? Spurred on by his sudden resolve he put down his guitar and set off after her. He pushed his way through the door into the darkness outside, already talking lest he lose his nerve, "Hey Clay I was wondering If you would like to-"

The rest of the sentence died in his throat as his mind finally comprehended the scene in front of him, he felt as though the world had turned upside down, leaving him to see it in a whole different way. He had the sense in that moment that everything he thought he knew had just changed irrevocably.

"Oh my God!"


	16. Chapter 16

Despite Jace's predictions, Simon's band actually wasn't that bad, it had been totally weird to see him there though. Simon formed a part of Clary's mundane life, encountering him while out hunting Eidolon demons was surreal.

Clary couldn't believe how easy the demons had been to find. She'd imagined trawling through back alleys hours after everything had closed, instead the entire group of them had walked into the bar and sat down, completely oblivious to the Shadowhunters seated on the other side of the room.

When the band started their last song the Eidolons got up and walked out the door, it made sense, the music ends, the bar empties out, they catch the stragglers.

Jace waited just long enough for the door to swing shut behind them before he stood, everyone else followed suit and then their group also made its way through the door. As soon as they were outside Clary held her hand out to stop Jace going any further, "We'd better put on glamours, there'll be mundanes walking around outside soon."

He inclined his head, "Fair point."

They must have made some small noise as they did it because they'd barely finished before the Eidolon demons were back, reappearing from whatever dark alley they'd been using to lay in wait. The leader of the group looked like a twenty-year-old women and with her dark hair and tanned skin she would have been quite beautiful were it not for the crimson eyes and claw-tipped fingers.

When she spoke Clary saw that her teeth were sharpened to points, "What have we here? Some baby Nephilim?" She grinned, "Surely this is past your bedtime? So kind of your adults to sacrifice their children to us!" The demons laughed and the Shadowhunters stiffened, Jace's dagger appeared in the leader's head. She didn't even have time to yell, ichor exploded outward and she folded into nothingness. For a moment shock silenced everyone, then the Eidolons began to scream in rage at the same moment Isabelle yelled, "Jace! A little heads up next time?"

Clary could hear the smile in his voice when he replied, "Just keeping you on your toes Iz!"

After that there was no more time for talking, the Eidolons rushed forward, and everyone scrambled for weapons, Clary named her seraph blade and used it to slice the nearest Eidolon's head off, it exploded with ichor and she barely managed to avoid the splash. She was looking for a new opponent when a male voice sounded behind her, shouting her name, some kind of question, it was too loud around her and she was too focused on the fight to make out the exact words, but she did gather that whoever was talking was not one of the fighters, which meant they were from the bar.

Clary turned, standing in the street was Simon, but that wasn't what made her blood run cold. It was the expression on his face; utter horror. That wasn't the kind of expression you wore when you found yourself on and empty street, it was the expression you wore when you stumbled upon a brutal battle between two species you didn't previously realise existed. They were wearing glamours; Simon shouldn't have been able to see  _anything_  but there he was, staring right at Clary. She realised a moment later that she too had been staring dumbfounded back at Simon. She began to turn back to the threat at hand, but she was too late. Something pushed her, with super-human strength into the brick wall of the Alto Bar. She hit it with a sickening crack and pain exploded in her chest, previous experience told her that she'd broken at least one rib, probably more.

"Clary!" a male voice called her name, then Jace was crouching in front of her, setting his stele against her skin and drawing an  _iratze_  rune. The pain subsided to a dull throb as her bones began to knit themselves together. She gave Jace a small smile to indicate that she was okay and he exhaled in relief, her eyes travelled over his shoulder, all the Eidolon demons had been reduced to puddles.

Using Jace's arm and the wall behind her, Clary stood. Her ribs twinged but not anything too painful which meant the  _iratze_  was doing its work. She looked down at herself, there were splashes of ichor on her jacket that she hadn't noticed during the fight, steaming as they slowly ate their way through the leather. Clary sighed in frustration and pulled it off, that was her second jacket in three days that had been destroyed. As she threw it to the ground she caught sight of the glamour rune on her arm, suddenly she remembered why she'd been thrown into the wall. She spun quickly around, Simon was still where she'd last seen him, rooted to the spot with fear, but soon that same fear that held him there now would propel him away, Clary could see it in his eyes. He took one step back then turned and ran but Clary was faster, she reached him long before he made it to the door and with a strength no-one her size should possess, yanked him to a stand-still.

"Let go of me!" he yelled but Clary just pushed him against the wall and held him there, everyone crowded around, "What are you-" Jace began but then his eyes slid between Clary and Simon and widened, "He can see us."

Simon struggled again, "Of course I can see you! I'm not blind!"

Jace grinned maliciously at him, "Of course you are, you just don't know it."

Simon writhed violently against Clary's hands, "Get away from me! You people are murderers!"

"No, we're not!" replied Clary hotly.

Simon looked at her incredulously, "You just killed a whole bunch of people!"

"They weren't people." Said Jace as though it was glaringly obvious, and Simon was being stupid on purpose.

"What were they then?" asked Simon in a tone that indicated he didn't believe a word anyone was saying.

"They were demons."

Simon looked around at them all with new terror, "Oh my God! You people are actually insane!"

"Simon," Clary tried for a gentler tone, "you saw them, they didn't look human, did they? Not really, and look over there," she nodded in the direction of the battle ground, "what happened to their bodies Simon?"

His gaze darted away and then back to Clary, "I'm calling the cops." But he said it with much less conviction this time.

Jace rolled his eyes, "Great plan, you can tell them the invisible people are harassing you."

"You're not invisible!"

A new thought occurred to Clary, "Simon, how long have you been able to see things no-one else can? Is it your entire life?"

"You. Are. Not. Invisible!" he enunciated each word carefully as though he was afraid they weren't understanding him.

"Answer the question!"

"No!"

That stumped Clary for a moment, "No you won't answer the question? Or no, not your entire life?"

He sighed, "No, not my entire life."

"When did it start?"

"Last week."

Jace turned to Clary, "We need to get him back to the Institute, Hodge will want to see him."

All the calm Simon had acquired went out the window, "I'm not going anywhere with you! Let me go!"

Jace glared at him, "Either you can come willingly mundane or…" he let the sentence hang in the air, the threat was clear.

Simon's jaw dropped, "Are you going to  _kidnap_  me?"

Jace opened his mouth to reply but at that moment the door to the bar began to open, "Simon?" a female voice called out.

Clary looked him in the eye, he was about five seconds away from yelling for help, which meant Clary had about five seconds to stop him. She snatched the stele Jace still held from his hand and used it to cancel out her glamour rune, she shoved it back into his hand then reached out, grabbed Simon's shoulders and pulled him in for a kiss, stopping any cry he'd been about to make with her own lips.

It's a strange sensation, kissing someone you're not attracted to, unlike Jace's kisses, which held so much passion they honestly seemed to burn, Simon kisses were mildly pleasant, without the emotions that give the activity its breathless fervour. The door swung open and a tiny girl that could have been anywhere between the ages of twelve and fourteen stepped out, she froze when she saw Simon and Clary making out in what looked to her to be an empty street, "Oh… sorry Simon… I'll… umm… talk to you later." Her eyes welled with tears and she fled back through the door. As soon as it slammed behind her Clary broke contact and stepped away, she couldn't help it, her eyes moved straight to Jace, for a moment his eyes betrayed hurt and anger, then his face smoothed back to its expressionless mask, she looked away.

"What the hell Clary?" Jonathan asked.

Glad for the distraction she glared at Simon, "He was going to yell."

"Don't crush his dreams so quickly Clary, that was probably the first real kiss rat face has ever had." Jace's voice dripped with sarcasm.

"Jace…" Clary voice held a silent plea that he be quiet, but of course he wouldn't, "Although you are the same age as him so maybe you're not his type, did you see his girlfriend? She was what? Twelve? I thought mundanes had laws against that stuff."

"Jace!" Alec that time, the warning clear in his voice.

He ploughed ahead anyway, "I really didn't have you pegged as the type to steal people's boyfriends Clary, but I suppose, what more can we expect from someone dressed like that."

The words had barely registered before Jace was gone, thrown up against the wall next to Simon by Jonathan, "Watch your mouth Herondale." he growled, Jace shoved him away, "Whatever."

He began to walk down the street away from them.

"Jace! Where are you going?" Isabelle called after him, her voice tinged with worry and exasperation.

He waved a dismissive hand over his shoulder and replied without turning, "I'm sure you can manage to transport one, scrawny mundane to the Institute without me. I'm bored."

Clary couldn't decide what she wanted to do more, burst into tears over his cruelty, or run after him and give him a kick, but she sensed he would find at great deal of satisfaction in either so instead she pulled out her stele and set about re-drawing her glamour rune, letting him walk away.

Simon gasped, he was staring at her.

"What?" she snapped, suddenly in a terrible mood.

He shook his head, "For a moment when you drew that thing on your arm you disappeared, then I could see you again."

Isabelle smiled but it looked strained, "What did we tell you mundane? Invisible."

Clary grabbed his upper arm, "Let's go."

Simon open his mouth to protest but she cut him off, "You  _will_  come with you to see Hodge and I'm going to tell you this once and once only Simon, I'm in a very bad mood, don't try to get away, it won't end well for you."


	17. Chapter 17

By the time she made it back to the Institute, Clary's animosity towards Simon had been mostly expunged, it wasn't really him she was angry with. They'd ridden the subway back and on more than one occasion Clary had had to remind him that he was the only one who could see them, as far as the rest of the passengers were concerned he was a mentally disturbed boy who was maintaining an argument with himself.

When they arrived it was no real surprise to anyone that Jace hadn't returned, so they proceeded to the library without him.

Hodge was extremely surprised to see them traipse through his door with a mundane, and even more surprised when they began to tell him everything that had happened that night. Halfway through the explanation Jace slipped into the room, unnoticed by everyone except his  _parabatai_  and Clary who, despite being furious with him couldn't help but be annoyingly attuned to his presence. He didn't look at either of them however, and they didn't announce his presence.

Jonathan, who'd taken it upon himself to fill Hodge in, finished the explanation and Hodge latched onto the most important part,

"He only got the sight a week ago? How is that possible?"

Jonathan shrugged, studying Simon, who was standing uncomfortably in front of Hodges desk, "He could have had a block on his mind that's faded."

Hodge looked sceptical, "So he's had the sight his entire life but only just uncovered it?"

Isabelle spoke up, "What does that make him?"

Alec snorted, "Well, he's not a Shadowhunter or a Downworlder, just look at him!"

Everyone did, Clary felt a surge of sympathy for Simon who was standing, awkward and afraid inside a ring of Shadowhunters who were examining him like an inconvenient puzzle with a piece missing. She stepped forward until she was standing beside him and Simon shot her a small grateful smile.

Hodge rubbed his eyes tiredly, "So he's a mundane with the sight, but who bothers to put a block on the mind of a mundane? And if it was placed so early that he has no recollection of anything before it, who would know to put it on him in the first place?"

Clary turned to Simon, "What are your parents like?"

Simon looked outraged, "They would never have anything to do with your freaky magic cult if that's what you're getting at!"

"We do not do magic!" hissed Alec.

Hodge smiled genially at Simon, "Perhaps," he said quietly, "It would be best not to insult the  _freaky magic cult_  when you're standing in their lair."

Jonathan, ever the epitome of focus said, "What were you getting at Clary?"

She shrugged, "If one of his parents was a Shadowhunter or Downworlder he could have been born with the sight. And if they were trying to hide from that life they wouldn't want Simon able to wander back into it, they could have had his mind blocked when he was a baby."

Isabelle was nodding, "That's actually pretty smart."

Clary rolled her eyes, "Always the tone of surprise."

She turned back to Simon, "You have a sister right? Did she ever say or do anything strange?"

He was looking increasingly distressed, "My family knows nothing about this world! They haven't been lying to me my entire life!"

It was clear that no-one believed him, Clary tried on last time, "It's not a choice Simon, we're born into this world."

He looked taken aback, "You have no choice?"

"Well yeah, but even if we did 99% of us would still choose this life."

"Why?"

The question took Clary by surprise, "What do you mean?"

"Even if a safe, happy life was offered to you you'd still choose the one with actual demons?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"It's what we're good at, we were literally born for this."

Simon opened his mouth to reply but Hodge cleared his throat, "You've gone off on a tangent, please Simon, tells us about when you discovered your Sight."

"About a week ago I stared seeing weird things, just out of the corner of my eye at first. Then when I was looking at things they started flickering and changing until eventually I wasn't seeing the glamours," he looked to Clary for confirmation that he'd gotten the word right, she nodded slightly, "anymore, just people with red skin or fairy wings, I thought I was going insane."

For the first time since he entered the room Jace spoke, "Just because the invisible people are real mundane, doesn't mean you're not mad."

Everyone but Clary and Alec started in surprise and turned to look at where Jace was leaning against the wall next to the door.

Hodge sighed, "I'm glad you finally decided to grace us with your presence, Jace."

Clary didn't bother to point out that Jace had actually been there for quite a while and neither did Jace, in fact, he remained uncharacteristically silent. Clary could feel his eyes burning into the back of her head, but she refused to turn and look at him.

Hodge turned his attention back to Simon, "Did anything abnormal happen a week ago?"

"Yes actually, my friend Erik took me to this club, called Pandemonium, I hated it, I was thinking about leaving and then the next thing I remember I was waking up at home in my bed with no idea how I got there, I asked Erik, he said I just disappeared and didn't tell anyone where I was going."

Jace snorted, "That was a special type of magic mundane, we call it alcohol, it has many mystical properties including memory loss and terrible dancing."

Simon glared at him, "I wasn't drinking, I'm under age."

Jace grinned, "So am I." The implication was clear.

Hodge waved his hand dismissively, "This is all very interesting, but it pales in comparison to a greater question, 'What do we do now?"

Jace posed the obvious answer, "We hand him over to the Clave, they can deal with him."

Hodge looked uncomfortable, "I'd rather not, they will most likely hand him over to the Silent Brothers which seems an unfairly cruel fate for a mundane whose only crime was being able to see. Besides, the people of this Institute have enough marks against their name without being the first Shadowhunters to be discovered by a mundane in the last century."

And so the debate began, Clary and Jonathan slipped out to send yet another extremely late voicemail to their mother and then joined the discussion which lasted well into the early morning until Clary had an idea, "I know a guy."

Everyone stopped talking, over the course of the night people's stances hadn't changed much, Alec and Jace wanted to hand Simon over to the Clave. Jace had also suggested just letting him go, and hadn't seemed particularly concerned when Hodge pointed out that demons would probably eat him when they realised he could see them. Clary, Jonathan, Hodge and Isabelle were debating alternative solutions though Clary suspected Isabelle was more concerned with defying the Clave than Simon's safety. And Simon was standing in the middle of it all looking increasingly pale as the night wore on.

"I know a warlock who could probably put the block back on Simon's mind," Jonathan's confused expression cleared, he knew who she was talking about, "so we won't have to wipe his memory or kill him." She glared at Jace who'd suggested that a few minutes ago, he shrugged like the outcome was a little disappointing.

Hodge looked interested, "Who?"

Clary shrugged, "Magnus Bane, he's the High Warlock of Brooklyn."

Everyone looked impressed, "You know the High Warlock of Brooklyn?" Isabelle sounded incredulous, "Then call him!"

Clary took out her phone and dialled the number, Magnus picked up after the third ring.

"Hello?"

"Hi Magnus, it's Clary."

"I know, I'm Magnus the Magnificent, I know everything."

She snorted, "You mean you have caller ID."

"That too. Anyway, is this a social call or a 'Magnus I'd be lost without you and your fantastic magical abilities call?"

"The second one. Can you block a mundane's mind from the sight?"

He was silent for a moment and then, "I can do something similar. Tell you what, I'm throwing a party, you can bring your problem along and I'll have a look."

He gave Clary the details then hung up, everyone was staring at her, she shrugged, "He's throwing a party tonight, he said we should bring Simon along and he'll see what he can do."

At the prospect of a party Isabelle clapped her hands in excitement, rushed forward grabbed Clary and began leading her to the door.

"What are you doing Isabelle?"

"We're going to the party of the High Warlock of Brooklyn, you need to go shopping."

"The High Warlock of Brooklyn has known me since I was two and his party is for Chairman Meow!" protested Clary, trying in vain to pull herself free.

Jonathan rolled his eyes but everyone else looked confused, so she elaborated, "His cat!"

For a moment Isabelle looked taken aback then she shrugged, "Who cares? It's a party and you don't own a dress!"

"I was going to sleep!"

"You can sleep anytime, this is important!"

Clary looked around the room for an ally, but everyone was too amused to help her. She locked eyes with Jace as she was tugged unceremoniously toward the door; he stared back at her, expressionless as ever. Isabelle bent to whisper in Clary's ear, "Besides, do you really feel like being stuck in the Institute with Jace right now?" Her voice held just enough venom that Clary knew she wasn't the only one angry about the way he'd behaved. She stopped resisting, it was nice, knowing Isabelle had her back.

Isabelle pulled again and in a louder voice said, "Come on Clary, I have to perform a miracle!"

Jace frowned slightly, and for a second Clary though he was still angry with her, she felt her blood boiling at the thought. The only person with the right to anger her was her. He'd practically called her a prostitute for God's sake! She'd already sworn not to forgive him. Then she realised he was frowning at Isabelle, and as the library door closed behind them she heard him say, "She doesn't need one."

Okay, so maybe he wasn't entirely unforgivable, but she still expected a damn good apology.


	18. Chapter 18

By the time she got back to the Institute Clary was exhausted. In an attempt to shorten the torture she'd agreed to the first dress Isabelle had picked out, an entirely wasted effort because she'd immediately been dragged off to look for matching shoes. And now she was laden down by shopping and dreading the moment when she would have to wear the heels that were going to murder her feet and the dress with the split up the side that made her blush just thinking about. Isabelle, on other hand, appeared to be utterly rejuvenated by the shopping and the prospect of a party, in fact, the sleepless night didn't appear to have affected her at all, her make-up was still perfect and her clothes unrumpled, it was annoying to say the least.

Clary was looking forward to nothing more than collapsing on her bed and taking advantage of a few hours of much needed sleep, but when she stepped into her room there was already someone there.

"What the hell Jace?"

He was sprawled across her bed, casually flipping through the sketchbook that not even Jonathan was allowed to touch. He didn't look up.

"You're a very good artist you know, sometimes even a great one, I'm a little disappointed that there aren't any romanticised sketches of me but otherwise it's quite impressive."

"You're not supposed to look at that." But her voice lacked conviction, despite being angry with him she just couldn't seem to muster up the same level of violation that usually came with people looking through what was essentially her pictographic diary. "I'm really tired, can you just go?"

He closed the sketch book and put it down, but made no move to get off the bed. After a moment of deliberation Clary kicked off her shoes, dropped her shopping bags and flopped down next to him, turning her back resolutely away. There was no way Jace was going to make her sleep on the floor.

"Clary look at me please."

There was something in his voice that made her roll over despite her best intentions, Jace was lying on his side staring at her.

"I'm sorry." Straightforward, direct, undeniably honest. For a moment Clary was thrown, Jace didn't seem like the apologetic type.

"It's okay, you didn't know you weren't supposed to look at it so I suppose you can be forgiven."

He shook his head, "Not about that, I'm sorry for the way I acted last night."

"How did you act?"

He gave her a wry look, "You're really going to drag this out aren't you?" He sighed, "I was very rude."

"Why?" She urged.

He met her gaze, his hair was rumpled from the bed, his expression open, he actually looked his age. Like he was a normal boy instead of an expert warrior, "Jealous. I was jealous, you were kissing him, and I was angry. I lashed out at you for it and I am so out of my depth here Clary, because if it had been anyone but you I wouldn't have cared." He said all this very fast, like he was unburdening himself a terrible secret as opposed to letting someone know he cared.

"On our  _shopping trip_  Isabelle told me that was how you would feel," Clary's words were beginning to slur with exhaustion and she could feel herself losing consciousness even as she spoke, "but she also said I should never expect you to say it."

He looked away, "I don't normally, well ever for that matter, but you turn everything on its head."

"Maybe that's not such a bad thing." She whispered gently, she could feel herself falling asleep but she saw Jace's eyes flick between her and the shopping bags on the floor.

"I'm looking forward to seeing your dress." Clary tried to answer but all of a sudden her eyelids were too heavy to hold open.

The door slammed open with a loud bang, Clary sat up, half asleep and disorientated. It took her a moment to remember why she was wearing jeans and sleeping on top of the covers, as soon as she did she looked over at where Jace had been lying, he was gone of course, but the sheets were rumpled where he'd been. Evidence that she hadn't been dreaming.

A noise of impatience came from the doorway, Isabelle was standing there, surveying Clary critically. Then her eyes landed on the shopping bags, she gasped.

"Clary tell me you didn't just leave your dress lying in the bag to get creased!" She stalked across the room and picked up the bags, "Come on, we need to get ready and it's going to take me half an hour at the least to fix your hair."


	19. Chapter 19

Clary and Isabelle had been late, and judging by the irritated looks she was getting from Clary it was Isabelle's fault. Jace's sister was dressed in her usual fashion, a spangled silver outfit that would look ridiculous on anyone else. Standing next to her and looking endearingly self-conscience, was Clary.

She was wearing a strapless, emerald green dress with a spit up the side that stopped mid-thigh. Her eyes met Jace's and she blushed, Jace realised his mouth was hanging open slightly.

She walked towards him, "I feel ridiculously over-dressed."

"You look beautiful." He said it quietly, but not quietly enough that she didn't hear him, her blush deepened.

"Even next to Isabelle?" she sounded dubious.

"Next to anyone."

Clary was walking at the back of the group with Simon, taking ludicrously small steps and resisting the urge to hold the split in her dress shut.

Simon looked nervous, "What's your 'friend' going to do to my head?"

"I don't know exactly, whatever he can to make you normal."

"What's so great about normal?"

Clary shrugged, "You'll live."

Simon looked aghast, "What?"

"If we can't make you normal again you'll have to ascend. We can't just let you go, a mundane with the sight wandering around? You'd end up being killed or locked up. But ascension's super dangerous, especially for someone as old as you, you might become a Shadowhunter, but if you're unprepared or unworthy you'll just die."

"When you say I'd be killed or locked up do you mean by Shadowhunters?"

"Maybe, but it's more likely you'll be locked up by other mundanes, nothing says crazy like seeing invisible monsters. And if the invisible monsters realise you can see them, they'll kill you. Mundanes with the sight are a dying breed, but they used to be a big part of Shadowhunter society, to demons it's like killing your arch-enemies' favourite pet."

Simon raised an eyebrow, "Pet?" He thought for a moment, "So I have two options, let your friend screw around with my mind, or become a Shadowhunter."

"And risk excruciating death." Clary reminded him.

Simon inclined his head, "And that."

"But if you let Magnus help you than this is all over, you'll be safe. Safe is good."

Simon snorted, "You don't honestly believe that."

"How do you know I don't?" Clary asked peevishly

"Because you learned a matter of days ago that your so-called allies were banding together and plotting to kill  _you_  specifically," Through the course of the night of debating Simon had inadvertently been told more than they'd intended, including about the Resistance. "any normal, safe person, would be terrified. They would run and hide because that's the safe thing to do, yet here you are."

Clary opened her mouth to answer but Jonathan called out, cutting her off, "We're here, And for god's sake Clary, we have targets painted on our heads, try to keep up."

Clary shot a quick grin at Simon, who was looking calmer and the lengthened her stride.

She reached the door to Magnus's apartment just as it was flung open by the flamboyant warlock himself.

He saw Jonathan first, "Jonathan!" His eyes roved the rest of the group quickly, "you bought friends," then his gaze fell on Clary and he gasped, "Good God Clarissa who dressed you?"

Clary bristled, "How do you know I didn't dress myself?"

"Because you're not wearing jeans."

Clary scowled and pointed, "It was Isabelle."

Magnus looked at the other girl and his eye's narrowed slightly, "Ah, a Lightwood, but I'm prepared to overlook that for the sake of your excellent fashion sense."

Isabelle opened her mouth, probably to make a snarky reply but Clary didn't hear it because Simon had leaned down whispered in her ear, "He has green cat's eyes, doesn't anyone else find that weird?"

He did indeed have cat's eyes, set into his Asian features and with the copious amounts of glittery eye make-up he was wearing, plus the electric blue sequined suit, Magnus Bane was quite the sight to behold. Clary had become used to his unusual appearance a long time ago and as a consequence she'd forgotten to warn Simon, she turned to answer but Magnus beat her to it.

"Yes, he does mundane, he also has excellent hearing." Magnus tilted his head, "but you shouldn't be able to see them," he turned to Clary, "so this is the problem you so desperately needed my help with? Best bring him inside then."

They stepped inside, Magnus's apartment was dirty as ever and filled with gyrating Downworlders, he smiled proudly, "What do you think of my party?"

Jonathan answered first, "I think it's ridiculous, where _is_  Chairman Meow?"

Magnus's face fell slightly, "He ran away."

"Well you can hardly blame him!" Clary exclaimed, "you threw a party for a cat and invited a bunch of vampires, cat's hate vampires."

"Everyone hates vampires." interjected Jace, "Even other vampires hate vampires."

Magnus looked slightly put out, "I really should have thought of that."

Clary stepped up beside him and patted his shoulder, "I'm sure he'll come back."

He nodded as Clary's friends spread out a bit more, examining the room. Magnus's eyes roved over the group, "Clary please tell me the hot one is as gay as I think he is?"

Clary looked at Jace and smirked, "I'm pretty sure he's straight."

Magnus caught where she was looking, "Not blonde one!"

It took a moment for his words to register, "Wait, which one's the 'hot one'?"

Magus raised an eyebrow, "The one with dark hair of course! Blue eyes and black hair, my favourite combination."

"I so did not need to know that. Anyway, his name is Alec and I'm not at liberty to discuss."

Magnus smirked, "That means yes. Best news I've heard all day. It's a wonder I've never gone for Shadowhunters before, they always have the best abs."

At that moment Jace raised his voice, "We're not here on a social visit you know!"

Magnus rolled his eyes, "I just remembered why. Arrogant bastards the lot of you."

Clary scoffed, and Magnus turned to Jace, "Herondale I presume."

Jace flinched, "How do you know that?"

"I am over a thousand years old you know."

Clary rolled her eyes, "Ignore him, his age changes every time he tells it."

Magnus smirked, "That's the beauty of being immortal, the people who actually know how old you are are too dead to contradict you."

"Way to put a positive spin on it."

Magnus waved his hand dismissively, "Point is, I've met plenty of your ancestors, some of them were very good people, but all Heronadle's seem to share a few key traits, recklessness to the point of suicide, haunting good looks, unbearably arrogant, and the admirable, yet potentially damning habit of falling in love once and once only," his gaze flickered to Clary as he said that one, "and so far as I have seen, all regretfully straight."

Jace made a choking sound and everyone else began to laugh, Magnus looked rather pleased with himself.

He clapped his hands together, "All right let's get down to business, as much as I love an awed audience when I'm demonstrating my genius this audience is too big, so Jonathan if you could take your posse and keep them occupied Clary and I will take the mundane to my boudoir and see if we can't fix his brain."

Simon cleared his throat, "I'm standing right here you know."

Jon nodded, usually he would never leave Clary alone in such a potentially dangerous place, but they'd known Magnus for as long as Clary could remember, Jonathan knew she was safe with him. Jace however was looking at Magnus with undisguised suspicion, "I'll come with you."

Jon shrugged and began leading Isabelle and Alec across the room, Magnus called after them, "The drinks are enchanted, I wouldn't touch them if I were you!" Jon waved a hand to indicate he understood.

"If payment is an issue I'll gladly take him." Grinned Magnus, his eyes fixed on Alec's retreating back.

Clary rolled her eyes, "No."

"Yeah," said Jace, "Maryse might take exception to us trading her first-born son for a magic spell."

"Besides you know payment isn't an issue."

Jace raised an eyebrow in a silent question.

Clary shrugged, "Mom wanted nothing to do with Valentine after… everything. So she gave everything that related to him to me and Jonathan, the last of the Morgenstern's, including his money."

"Yes, yes Clary," Magnus said impatiently leading them down a hallway, "your messed-up family history is fascinating, and we're all very impressed by your trust-fund but I believe you're here for a reason."

He pushed a door open and they stepped inside, this week Magnus's bedroom looked like a broke college boy's, there were clothes strewn everywhere and his bed consisted of a mattress on the floor. Distaining for curtains, he'd used a mixture of glitter, paint and dust to black out his windows, same as the rest of the house.

Clary saw Jace's fists clench at his sides and bit back a smile, she'd walked past his room the other day and seen the OCD level of cleanliness maintained in it, Magnus's room must have been killing him.

The warlock turned and smiled, beckoning Simon towards him. He held up his hands and blue sparks began emanating from his fingertips, his smile turned to a leer, "This won't hurt a bit." He placed his glowing fingers and against Simon's temples. Clary rolled her eyes, Magnus had a taste for the dramatics.

They stayed that way for a while, then Magnus stiffened, and frowning, pulled his hands form Simon's face.

"Now that  _is_  interesting."


	20. Chapter 20

Simon's eyes snapped open and he voiced the question on Clary's lips, "What? What's wrong?"

Magnus stepped back, his hand falling too his sides, the blue glow fading.

"Blocking the sight from someone's mind is dangerous, and almost always detrimental to the subjects' mental wellbeing. I was going to do what your mother asked me to do for you and Jonathan, Clary." His gaze meets hers, his lips turning down at the corners as he took in her expression. Clary and Jonathan had been told what their mother had planned on doing to them and though she understood the reasons behind it, it still made Clary angry when she thought of what her mother had very nearly taken from her.

Magnus elaborated, for those not up to speed on her twisted past, "When Clary was a baby Jocelyn wanted nothing more to do with the Shadoworld. She came to me, asking if I could but a block on her and her brother's minds, I refused, but said that I could perform a kind of on-going memory wipe. As they saw things from the Shadoworld they would be erased from their minds. Obviously, Jocelyn was persuaded away from that possibility," He turned to Simon, "but that is what I was going to do to you."

Jace stepped forward, " _Going_? As in, not anymore?"

"I'm not sure it would be wise."

"Why not?" Simon sounded more nervous than relieved.

Magnus regarded him with pity and something close to wonder, "It would not be wise because Sheldon already has magic in his mind."

"That's not his name." muttered Clary absently as she stared in shock at Simon who was once again white as a sheet.

Jace was looking confused, "That's not possible, he's a mundane."

Simon nodded vigorously, "Though I don't exactly agree with the terminology I am definitely, positively, 100 percent human!"

Magnus regarded him coolly, "I'm not saying you're anything other than 'definitely, positively, 100 percent human' I'm saying I am not the first of my kind to tamper with your mind."

"What?"

"It's buried deep but I'd be willing to wager it was only put there a week or so ago, the workmanship is incredible, whoever did this is very skilled, very powerful and very, very old, which is never a good thing."

Simon was looking increasingly panicked, "Why not?"

"My kind are immortal, and when we've been alive for millennia, well, let's just say that the mind feels the years the body does not."

Simon made a choking sound, "I think I'd remember a warlock with a, what? Deteriorating mind and glowing hands!"

Sparks practically flew from Magnus's eyes, "I could make you forget your own name, Samuel, if I so desired it. You think that someone even more powerful than me wouldn't be capable of making you forget them?"

"That's not my name!" Simon exploded; stress and fear making him lash out.

Clary cut through Magnus's reply, "And that's what gave him the sight?"

Magnus turned to her, "Yes."

"Can you, I don't know, remove it or something?"

Magnus was already shaking his head before the sentence was finished, "Hard enough to put it in there without damaging something, practically impossible to remove without causing permanent damage. I wouldn't be willing to attempt to remove this from the mind of a Shadowhunter, and they're far more adapt at coping with magic than mundanes."

Jace raised an eyebrow, "Could you put another layer of magic over that one? You know, the on-going memory wipe?"

Magnus stroked his chin thoughtfully, "I could, the last magic performed on him didn't scramble his brains so he must be strong, for a mundane, but he's getting a little too old for this type of magic and his Sight will corrode at it. I'm not sure how well it will work or how long it will last."

"Just do it and we'll try and figure out a better solution later."

"Very well."

Magnus's glowing hands extended towards Simon once more who was now regarding him with curiosity, "Does yours?"

Magnus stalled, "Does my what?"

"Does your mind feel the years your body does not?"

Magnus smiled sadly,

"I am tired of tears and laughter,

And men that laugh and weep,

Of what may come hereafter,

And men that sow to reap,

I am tired of days and hours,

Blown buds of barren flowers,

Desires, dreams and powers,

And everything but sleep.

It's part of a poem I read and loved, a very long time ago now. The truth is Simon, despite what everyone thinks, no-one really wants to live forever."

Then he pressed his glowing fingers against Simon's temples and Simon talked no more.

Clary and Jace had been standing in the corner of the room watching as Magnus rooted silently through Simon's head for at least the last fifteen minutes when all of a sudden, the party got much louder; punctuated, not by the sounds of frivolity but by screams and grunt and breaking furniture. Simultaneously Clary and Jace grabbed their weapons and began to move towards the door but Magnus's voice stopped them.

"I wouldn't worry about it, some children of the moon probably decided to gate crash, there are so many vampires down there it's bound to cause a ruckus, it'll die down in a few minutes."

Sure enough the sounds subsided, Clary and Jace had just resumed their slouched positions against the wall when pounding footprints sounded outside and the door was flung open.

Standing framed in the doorway was Isabelle, her hair a fly-away mess, her dress ripped and a cut running down one cheek. But far more disturbing than her dishevelled appearance was the well of tears in her eyes. Isabelle, who was never anything but beautiful, calm and in control was  _crying_. Jace was across the room and standing in front of his step-sister in an instant, but Clary didn't move. Rooted to the spot by a sense of all-pervading dread.

Jace asked the first question that comes to every Shadowhunter's mind, "Demons?"

Isabelle shook her head, "Downworlders," she muttered in a broken whisper, "we tried to fight but there were so many, and they took them."

"Took who?" Jace's words contained a panicked edge, he, like Clary, had already guessed the answer.

"Alec, they took Alec." Her tortured gaze shifted to Clary, "And your brother."


	21. Chapter 21

Jace heaved himself through the doorway, disappearing almost instantly from sight, by some unspoken consensus that it would do no good, no-one else moved. By the same token however, no-one attempted to stop him, Jace wasn't the kind of guy who could sit by and do nothing. Magnus left a few moments later, but only long enough to break up his party, not exactly a mean feat since most partygoers had fled when the fight broke out; he was back within a few minutes. He stood directly in front of Clary who still hadn't moved.

"Clary, I'm going to try and track them, but I need something of Jonathan's, something linked to him do you have anything?"

Numbly Clary hooked her fingers through the chain she always wore and pulled it up and over her head, dangling on the end was a man's ring with an 'M' and a pattern of falling stars making up the insignia.

"The Morgenstern ring." Magnus breathed, staring at it with a horrified kind of fascination.

Clary nodded, "It's not his, he wears his but still…"

"It's a link to him, to his bloodline," his eyes met Clary's with sympathy, "and to his sister." She nodded again and he held out his hand, reluctantly she dropped the ring, chain and all into his outstretched palm, his fingers closed around it, "This should work."

Clary could not bear to watch in case it didn't work so she returned to staring at the door, waiting for Jace's return, or maybe she was just waiting for her brother, at that point she really couldn't tell anymore.

Eventually Jace came back, and despite themselves everyone turned to look at him, except for Simon who continued to stare bemusedly at a patch of wall (Magnus had assured Clary that the dazed effect was only temporary). Jace shook his head dejectedly, the occupants of the room let out a collective sigh, then Isabelle resumed her pacing and Magnus turned back to his tracking spell. Though Clary had found something new to occupy her attention, Jace.

She stepped towards him and he took a step away, avoiding her gaze he muttered, "They were nowhere in sight, I should have gone and checked when we heard fighting."

Clary took another step towards him and this time he didn't move away, she placed her hand on his arm, "This wasn't your fault Jace. A radicalistic Downworlder hate-group wants mine, and my brother's, heads on spikes, this was bound to happen at some point. I'm just sorry Alec got caught up in it."

Jace lent forward until his forehead was resting against Clary's, "This isn't your fault either you know."

"Are you sure? Because it feels like it."

"I'm sure. So what now?"

Clary shrugged, "We get them back."

Magnus's voice invaded their murmured reassurances, "If you're both quite done dividing up the blame, this isn't working," he held up the ring, "I need to try something else, take me to the Institute. Also we need to do something with him." He inclined his head in the direction of Simon.

 

 

An hour later Simon had been deposited home and they were all once again gathered in the library of the Institute.

Magnus had monopolized Hodge's desk and was sitting at it with a small pile of Alec and Jonathan's personal belongings, none of them were working.

He rubbed his tired eyes, "So, they've been hidden from my tracking spells."

"Which means what?"

"The Downworlders have fairies or warlocks on their side, maybe both."

Clary felt the beginnings of panic grip her, "How will we find them?"

It was Jace who spoke, "We won't, they'll find us. They don't want Alec, they want Clary. If I were in charge I'd propose a trade."

Clary's panic crystalized inside her. Catching the expression on her face Jace stepped forward and gripped her shoulders, "By the Angel Clary, I'm not suggesting that we should throw you to the wolves. I'm just saying that they'll probably make contact and we should come up with a plan once we have more information."

Isabelle had gathered herself admirably and even managed a small smirk, "I wouldn't get my hopes up, Jace's plans usually run along the lines of let's go there and kill them. He does have a point though, it makes sense for them to assume that you mean nothing to us, I mean what Shadowhunter is going to value the life of the child of Valentine over one of our own… No offence." The last statement seemed tacked on as an after-thought.

Jace glared at his sister but Clary just muttered a dull "None taken."

"Isabelle," Hodge admonished in a grave voice, "Clary  _is_  one of our own."

Isabelle ignored them all and focused on Clary, "That's not what I meant."

Clary nodded her understanding.

"Well now that everyone's got their allegiances sorted out, I'm off." Magnus stood, "There's not much more I can do here though I'll keep trying." He looked directly at Clary, "Will you be all-right?"

"Yes." She was lying but there was little Magnus could do to help her and she knew being in the Institute made him uncomfortable, she could hardly hold that against him.

He made his way towards the door, "If I find anything I'll tell you immediately." Within minutes he'd exited the Institute.

Which perhaps was for the best, since the next people to arrive were unlikely to have taken kindly to his presence. The first sign of the newcomers was the creak of the library door followed quickly by a delighted yell, then a small body was racing through the room and throwing himself at Jace.

Jace caught him easily and despite the situation smiled, "Hey Max."

A few seconds later a man and a woman walked through the doors, they were both pale with black hair and blue eyes and couldn't have been any other than Maryse and Robert Lightwood.

Maryse focused on Hodge, her expression was fierce, "The situation with the Downworlders had better be as dire as you said Hodge. We were in Idris."

Perhaps she was tipped off by the air of gloom, or perhaps some mother's sixth sense alerted her, whatever the reason she stopped moving and glanced around, the sharpness of her face faded and was replaced by something akin to dread, "Where's Alec?"


	22. Chapter 22

Everyone shifted uneasily, avoiding the frosty gazes of Maryse and Robert in favour of a patch of floor or an ornament on a desk. The silence stretched uncomfortably long, everyone waiting with bated breath to see who the first person to break it would be. Before anyone could say anything though, there was a flash of fire and a note appeared on the desk.

A startled Hodge reached for it but Jace was faster, bounding across the room and snatching it up. He read it quickly and nodded slightly, in no way surprized by the information it contained. Then he read it aloud,

"Pretty though he is, we have no need of the Lightwood brat. Clarissa Morgenstern however, is another matter entirely. As a show of good will, we will gather in a Shadowhunter location, the meeting place in central park. Bring Clarissa at midnight tonight and you can have your whelp, if not, you can have his head. You should know too, we are watching all of little Clarissa's Downworlder friends, especially the warlocks, you would be wise to avoid cheap trickery."

Jace looked up, "See? I'm always right." The statement held all of his usual swagger, but the look in his eyes was fragile.

"So we go at midnight, we take everyone we can get, kill them all and take Alec and Jonathan back by force. Simple." Isabelle looked around the room with something akin to desperation, waiting for everyone to agree.

Jace shook his head, "Downworlders aren't stupid, especially fairies, and this has the fae written all over it. They know how we operate, they'll be expecting that. Alec will be there but there's no way in hell they'll bring Jonathan. Even if they believe we don't care about the Morgensterns they're not going to risk it."

Isabelle flicked her hair in irritation, "Well what do you suggest then Jace? We can't just let them die!"

Despite the terribleness of the situation Clary's heart warmed to hear her discussing Jon's fate with as much concern as Alec's.

Jace on the other hand, was looking angrier by the second, "Of course not but-"

He was cut off by Robert, "We should do exactly what they want." He was looking at Clary with disgust, "No child of Valentine's is worth risking the safety of my son."

It didn't even occur to Clary that he was also talking about her, she was thinking of her brother, who had always protected her, who had learned Shadowhunter skills twice as fast as Clary but still refused to move on to the next thing until she got it as well, who was only in this situation because she had begged and pleaded for an adventure.

She was standing in front of Robert before she realised she was moving, "Don't you dare! Don't you dare say that my brother is worthless!" Her voice was low and deadly, "You don't know him, and you don't know me. I may be Valentine's daughter, but I have never violated the laws or the accords, which is more than can be said for you. I've heard plenty of stories, you're in some of them. I know your secrets, Robert Lightwood, and they should make you ashamed."

She stepped closer and lowered her voice so much that she was sure no-one but Robert could hear her. "Would Rachel Whitelaw now be in charge of this Institute do you think? Had you not run her through?" He flinched like she'd hit him.

"You are not, and you will never be, in any kind of a position to judge someone else's worth."

She watched with savage pleasure for a moment as the colour drained from his face then she turned and ran from the room.

Clary found herself sitting in one of the pews of the church at the entrance of the Institute, she'd been heading to the door when she realised abruptly that she had nowhere to go and the only people who stood any chance of helping her save her brother wanted to use her as a bargaining chip. She'd been sitting there for what felt like hours when the elevator sounded behind her. She didn't turn to see who it was, somehow, she knew it could only be one person.

He sat down next to her, so close that their thighs and shoulders were pressed together, despite herself Clary's body tingled in a response only Jace could instigate.

"I figured you'd be gone."

Clary shrugged and voiced the thought she'd had earlier, "I have nowhere to go."

"Yes, you do, you have plenty of places you could have gone. You just didn't want to."

"I'm not a coward. If you're going to hand me over I'm not going to run and hide. I'm a Shadowhunter. I won't make you hunt me down and drag me back like a scared child."

She still hadn't looked at him but she felt his body tense next to hers, "I would've hunted you down and dragged you back; but not so I could hand you over."

"Your brother is gone Jace, you have to do whatever you can to get him back. I would."

"Your brother is gone too Clary, and are you honestly saying that if the roles were reversed you'd hand me over?"

"Yes." The statement lacked conviction and apparently Jace thought so too,

"Liar."

"Maybe you should though. Do you want to know why you're so much stronger and faster then everyone around you?"

He shifted uncomfortably, "Because I was born awesome?" For what was probably the first time in his life, Jace sounded uncertain of his prowess.

Clary smiled slightly but there was a bitter taste in her mouth, "Well, you were born awesome."

"I sense that that wasn't intended as the compliment it should be."

She looked down at her fingers twisted in her lap, Shadowhunter hands, artist hands, it didn't often occur to her, how lucky she was that they were both. That her and her brother were blessed to be have been allowed to choose what they did with their hands, with their bodies, with their minds. She doubted anyone had ever asked Jace if he wanted to be anything other than a soldier in an endless war.

"My father was a fanatic. His followers didn't realise it at the time, he had a certain charisma, gravitas, it made it hard to see that he was completely insane."

It was one of the things Clary hated most about him – that charisma. It reminded her of where she came from. Jonathan may have been Valentine's body double, but it was Clary who inherited his passion, his stubbornness, the way he would see a plan through regardless of consequences or adversity, and that charisma. More than once when she was presenting an idea or winning an argument Clary had seen that small flicker of dread, the one that appeared every time one of Jocelyn's children reminded her of their father, pass across her mother's face. Clary was perfectly, hatefully, aware that she incited the expression far more often than her brother.

"But he was insane, and obsessed with the idea of creating better Shadowhunters, ones that could win the war, obliterate the demons and the Downworlders instead of just holding them at bay. Have you ever seen an angel Jace? My father did. He summoned one, locked it away, tortured it and extracted its blood."

Jace had gone rigid beside her, she wasn't entirely sure that he was still breathing, she kept studying her hands, not brave enough to look at him.

"He gave the blood to my mother, when she was pregnant with Jonathan and again when she was pregnant with me. And to your mother too Jace.

We – the three of us – Jonathan, me and you are his experiments, his weapons. Created by the monster who mutilated an angel. It was my father who cut you from your mother's body. Never one to let a good science project go to waste. After he was killed it took days to track down the traitor that was watching you for him, they took her alive and when she was questioned she revealed something awful."

Jace was yet to move an inch, yet to give any reaction at all to what she was telling him.

"The official story is that your mother was so distraught after your father died that she killed herself, but she loved you Jace, just as much as she loved her husband. The Shadowhunter woman who'd been looking after you for Valentine during the uprising said that he'd gone to visit your mother after Stephen died. She told him she was leaving, that she couldn't bear to be a Shadowhunter anymore when Shadowhunters were the reason the love of her life was gone from her. He couldn't let her take you though, not when he'd worked so hard to create you, so he slit her wrists and stole you away.

So, I could understand Jace, if you of all people wanted nothing to do with helping a child of Valentine Morgenstern."

Her confession over, Clary gathered every last scrap of her courage and dragged her gaze to his face. He was deathly pale, his eyes dull and flat. He looked, Clary thought, as if someone had sucked the life from him, as if _she_  had sucked the life from him.

He cleared his throat, "That was… a lot." He said 'a lot' as if he'd meant to say something else entirely but the words had failed him.

He opened his mouth like he was going to say more but at that moment Clary's pocket vibrated, playing the customised sound she'd set months ago as a joke – a person clucking their tongue in disapproval – Jonathan was texting her.


	23. Chapter 23

Clary pulled out her phone, there were no words in the messages, just a series of pictures of a small, unfurnished, industrial looking room from every possible angle.

"What the hell is that about?" asked Jace, he was staring at her phone over her shoulder, looking for all the world like his normal self. If Clary hadn't been the one to say it she never would have believed that he'd just been told his mother was murdered. It made something in her chest ache, to consider how much practice he must have had to be this good at hiding his emotions.

"It's pictures of where Jon is being held." She had to smile, even kidnapped and locked away, Jon always knew what she needed from him.

Jace frowned, "Are you sure it's him? It seems like a trap to me, why didn't they take his phone?"

Clary shrugged, "He's a good, paranoid Shadowhunter, keeps it in a secret compartment of his gear. Plus it's not like they really expect Shadowhunters to have mobile phones since most of you insist on living in the goddamn dark ages. Besides, he clearly has no idea where he is – he would have texted an address if he did, and it's not as if we can get these to a warlock, remember?"

"Right." He made a noise in his throat that might have been a groan or an almost inaudible swear word, "So it doesn't help us at all then, without a warlock we can't portal to him."

The smile that spread across Clary's face was nothing short of vicious, "They didn't say we couldn't portal, just that we couldn't go to any warlocks."

Jace gave her an odd look, like he couldn't decide whether he was wary or excited by the expression on her face, "Explain."

She told him her plan.

 

 

"This is a dumb plan." this was not the first time Isabelle had made that declaration, it wasn't even the first time in the last ten minutes.

"Oh, really Izzy? Do please enlighten us on the reasoning behind this startling and unexpected opinion." Jace's voice dripped, gushed, flooded with sarcasm.

Walking a few steps ahead, Izzy whipped her head around to glare at him, her dark braid swinging through the air like a weapon. Actually, everything about Isabelle looked weaponised; from her runes and gear to her steel-toed stiletto boots and lipstick a shade of purple that might have belonged to something poisonous.

Alec and Isabelle may have looked like twins but it was easy to remember that she was also Jace's sister. There was something crafted about the both of them that Alec lacked. Alexander Lightwood seemed never to expect anyone to look in his direction, everything about him fell together naturally and haphazardly. Completely at odds with his siblings whose every outfit, word and action were designed with an audience in mind.

"I'm just saying, it doesn't seem like the smartest thing in the world to do exactly what they're telling us to do." Isabelle was stilling glaring daggers at Jace, more proof that they were related, only siblings could throw that much venom at each other.

"We're not doing exactly what they're telling us to." Jace's voice had taken on a slow, condescending tone, as if he were talking to a particularly dim child. Clary took a subtle step away from him in case Izzy attacked.

"I'm sorry, but which part of handing Clary over to a terrorist cell of Downworlders in exchange for our brother isn't doing exactly what they're telling us to?"

"The part where Clary turns out to be a hell of a lot more than they anticipated." There was an edge of reverence to his tone, Clary turned her face away, so he couldn't see the blood pounding through her cheeks, and worked to keep her voice steady as she said, "We'll be there soon, time to get into character."

They arrived at the clearing. Closer to the opposite side of the ring of trees than to the centre was a cluster of Downworlders; fairies, vampires, werewolves and even a few warlocks, 30 in all. Clary recognised only one of them. Behind the group, chained and practically vibrating with fury, was Alec. Standing as she was, in Isabelle and Jace's shadows, her wrists shackled, de-runed and unarmed, Clary winced in sympathy.

A fairy stepped forward to greet them, "Midnight exactly." He observed. The artist in Clary wept a little at the sight of him. With his long blue-black hair, eyes the colour of vines and a small leaf-shaped tattoo stretching across one of his cheekbones, he had the kind of cold beauty she could paint forever and never quite get right. The artist side of her was tempted to try, the Shadowhunter side of her was tempted to try separating his pretty head from his body. Especially since she knew him, they all did, Meliorn was a fairly public figure among the fairies.

Jace's swagger was out in full force, "Well you know what they say about punctuality."

"Regretfully, I cannot say that I do." Meliorn cocked his head, like all fairies, he had an eerie way of staring at people. Ancient and animalistic, as if they could see your whole life etched across your skin and didn't understand the appeal of any of it.

"Neither do I, presumably good things though." He turned to Isabelle, "Is it a virtue? Punctuality is a virtue?"

She rolled her eyes, "Patience is a virtue."

"Oh. Well, that's me all out of ideas then, but I'm sure someone, somewhere has said something about it being good at some point."

Meliorn glanced between them, looking aloofly amused, "As we are speaking of points, I am beginning to wonder if what you are saying has one. I would almost go so far as to accept the point of a blade if it would liberate me from the burden of listening to your drivel."

Jace opened his mouth to retort but Isabelle beat him to it, "He doesn't have a point, if you knew anything about him at all you'd know he just likes hearing himself speak." She gave the fairy a smile that could lure men merrily off cliffs, "I, on the other hand, have always found far better uses for mouths."

He leaned toward her slightly, not even the fey are immune to Isabelle. But still said, in a voice like music and thorns, "We've heard the stories of course, the great Jace Herondale in love with no-one and nothing but himself. We Downworlders make a point to lend an ear to stories of promising young Shadowhunters, that way we can one day put a name to the knives in our backs."

Jace didn't falter for a second, "Don't be ridiculous Meliorn, I would never stab you in the back, I'd stab you in the front. It's the polite thing to do." It was a near perfect delivery, most people wouldn't have known the taunt had hurt him at all.

Clary wasn't most people, she longed to reach out and touch Jace, but she was supposed to be playing the role of the terrified prisoner. Besides, he probably wouldn't have appreciated the gesture anyway.

It seemed Meliorn wasn't most people either. His small smile made it clear he knew exactly who had just won that round. "As delightful as your company is, I'd very much like to make the trade and be finished with this, I've no desire to keep your Shadowhunter brat around any longer than necessary and we're so looking forward to becoming acquainted with Clarissa."

The other Downworlders who had, until this moment, remained silent during the exchange, began snarling and laughing, they fixed their gazes on Clary and she felt her skin crawl. It was every time a man had yelled to her from a moving car, every leer she'd ever received while walking alone, magnified by a thousand. These weren't demons, these were people, like her friends, like her step-father, and they wanted to lay their hands on her, they wanted to hurt her. She'd never felt more vulnerable.

She wasn't entirely faking her cowering now. She missed Jon like he'd left a hole in her chest.

Jace grabbed her wrist and yanked her forward, his thumb rubbing soothing circles on the underside of her arm where it couldn't be seen, the gentleness entirely at odds with the harsh expression on his face. She knew the small movement was an apology for what was about to come.

"So give us Alec and we can part ways amicably. Or at least as amicably as we can, considering I plan on hunting down each and every one of you like the animals you are, to make you pay for laying your hands on my parabatai."

He ran his eyes over the group like he was memorising their faces, he probably was. "After all, I'm the great Jace Herondale, I can't have people thinking they can touch my things and get away with it. It's a matter of pride."

Clary realised she'd been wrong before, when she thought he's been hurt by Meliorn's taunt, he'd sensed an opportunity. He was helping them make a villain of him, if they thought he barely cared for his parabatai they wouldn't question his willingness to hand over a Shadowhunter girl he hardly knew.

The Downworlders shifted uneasily, they clearly had no trouble believing Jace was coming for them. For the first time they looked a little uncertain about their course of action. The only person unruffled was Meliorn, who still had that little smile twisting his face with secrets. It was impossible to tell what he was thinking. He gestured to have Alec bought forward, "I must say, I was a little taken aback by your agreement to this trade, I thought Shadowhunters cared more for their own."

Jace shoved Clary ahead of him, "She isn't one of our own. Valentine Morgenstern didn't just betray the Downworld, he betrayed his own kind and his sacred oath. Shadowhunters care for blood, and hers is poison."

Even the knowledge that he was lying couldn't completely soften the blow of the words. They tugged at the already unravelling threads of Clary's heart, possibly, when this was all over, she would cry for a decade. But for now there was far too much riding on her for her to break down. So she cowered in the no-man's land between the two parties, doing her best to look small and non-threatening. It wasn't hard, she'd always been small, it made people underestimate her. Even banded in muscle, runed and dressed in Shadowhunter leathers she couldn't hide her smattering of freckles and artist hands, she'd never quite been able to shed her mundane trappings the way Jonathan could. She always looked like a girl caught between worlds.

Meliorn made a small gesture with his hand, the fairies holding Alec released him with a shove between his shoulders, sending him careening across the clearing to his family. At the same time Clary began walking toward the Rebel Leader. She met Alec in the middle and tried to give him a reassuring smile, his panicked glare indicated that despite her efforts he was not calmed. Her shoulders bunched as they moved out of sight of each other, if he said anything he could ruin the plan. He didn't speak though, and Clary made it to enemy territory without incident.

Unsurprisingly Clary was immediately grabbed and Dragged to the back of the horde, they were barely watching her, too consumed with the far showier threat, Jace.

"Hey Mel, -Can I call you Mel? I feel that we've been through enough together to warrant nicknames; remember how you kidnapped my brother and held him for ransom? And then I vowed revenge? Good times. Bonding moments. Anyway, Mel, it's occurred to me that there's very little stopping me from just getting on with the revenge. We're all gathered here so conveniently, it seems a waste to miss an opportunity." The whole monologue was delivered with a cheerful smile, at odds with the dagger he'd pulled from somewhere on his person and was now examining in a menacing sort of way. Even the handful of Downworlders who'd been keeping a cursory eye on Clary were watching Jace now, slowly, silently, she began to move.

Meliorn, did not sound menaced when he replied, "You're outnumbered Shadowhunter, but by all means, if you feel tempted to throw your life and that of your companions' at our feet we will not object." He sounded pleased.

 

 

No one moved though, Jace's apparent sunny disposition hadn't lifted, and they were stuck in a nervous stalemate as they waited to see what cards he had up his sleeve. He felt more than saw Isabelle step up next to him, which meant she'd successfully unchained, runed and armed Alec. Sure enough his parabati was at his other side less than a second later.

He wanted to turn and stare at his brother, safe and alive and retrieved even after Jace had feared he would be lost, still might be lost, if this risk they had taken didn't pan out.

He wanted to fight his way to Clary, she'd walked willingly into the mob intent on tearing her apart, but he knew he wasn't the one to rescue her from that. There was nothing Jace could do for her but provide a good distraction. So he began tossing his dagger into the air, knowing it would glitter in the moonlight, casting eerie shadows across his face. Knowing too, that Isabelle, who always had as much of a taste for theatrics has he did, would be smiling like she might eat them, like they might enjoy it.

Alec, who possessed no ability for guile whatsoever, had enough rage to make up for it, and would draw just as terrifying a figure as his siblings.

So the Downworlders kept hesitating and Jace refused to let his hands tremble or his smile waver or his gaze wander, he was a Herondale. He could put on a show.

Then, the Downworlders' faces collapsed into various states of shock and horror, Jace could picture the scene unfolding behind him in his mind. A portal opening, Shadowhunters pouring from it, like death given form. There wouldn't be many, it was short notice, but there would be enough at least to even the odds.

"Sorry to have pulled the rug from under you Mel, nothing personal, I promise. I'm just terrible at playing by the rules. And you know who else is bad at doing as they're told? Morningstars."

The fairy looked, if possible, even more shocked and horrified. He turned on the spot and screamed "Move!" his followers parted like the red sea than began to run. Jolted to unintended action by their leader they fled. The Shadowhunters who had arrived as backup gave chase.

Jace wasn't watching them though, his eyes were on the red-head who'd retreated to the very edge of the clearing, and the portal drawn into a particularly large tree. Clary tossed him a wicked smile over her shoulder than ran unflinchingly into the impossibility she had created with the divinity in her veins. Jace threw his dagger at Meliorn's head.


	24. Chapter 24

While Clary had appreciated Jace's flair for the dramatics during the few minutes he'd had to distract everyone, she was resenting them a little now. She'd heard him gloating to Meliorn before she ran into the portal, and apparently so did a few of Meliorn's more zealous followers. She'd been persued and was now locked in a small room with four Downworlders intent on ripping her to shreds and no weapons except for the knife she'd hidden in her boot alongside her stele.

At least with no one to hold it open the portal was closing rapidly, she'd be saved from becoming anymore outnumbered than she already was. Even as she had the thought though, she saw the portal shimmer again over the Downworlders' shoulders. Clary's heart sank like a stone, four Downworlders had been asking too much of her. Anymore and she was without hope.

No one had attacked yet. With the exception of warlocks, Downworlders were generally unused to portal travel, it took them a few moments to adjust. She stepped forward, she had an advantage to press and a score to settle. She was going to die because of these Downworlders, her brother was going to die because she couldn't get to him. She threw herself at the nearest werewolf.

He was a big man, towering and muscled, he hadn't yet had the chance to shift. He grunted in surprise as Clary hit him and clung on. His hands came around her like an embrace, but his fingernails were changing to claws, puncturing her skin like it was tissue paper. In a second she would be torn apart, she didn't give him a second. Her knife slid between his ribs. He grunted again, this time in a muted sort of agony. His claws retracted, he fell.

Clary looked around and found herself crouching in a room full of bodies, she looked up at the newcomers; Jace, Isabelle and Alec had followed her through the portal.

Clary's adrenaline began to flag with the sudden lack of enemies to fight, the puncture wounds in her back began to throb in a way she knew from experience would only get worse.

She should apply an  _iratze_ , but instead she just looked between the body at her feet and her hands.

The body looked like a man, it hadn't disappeared, it wouldn't disappear. He was still leaking blood from the hole in his chest. Ichor burned like acid when it touched you but at least it didn't look like blood. There was blood everywhere, his chest, her knife, dripping from her hands where they clasped around her weapon like she was praying. Praying over the man she'd just killed. He looked nothing at all like Luke. She still wanted to call her step-father, just in case.

Then there were calloused fingers brushing across her cheeks. Jace. She hadn't even noticed him approaching. His hands were so careful where they touched her, like she might break if he wasn't gentle, when he moved she saw that his fingertips were glistening. Until then she hadn't realised she was crying.

"I swear I'm not normally one for tears, I don't even know why I'm doing it now." Her choked voice mangled her words.

"This has all been..." He failed to produce a word that accurately described the situation. "It would be concerning if you weren't upset. Right now though, we need to find your brother."

Clary's stomach lurched, she couldn't believe she'd been bawling like a baby while her brother needed her.

She looked around the room, taking in details for the first time. It was definitely the same one as the pictures she'd been sent; dark, windowless and covered in the kind of grime caused only by abandonment. Excluding portals, there was only one exit and Jon wasn't anywhere to be seen.

Clary took a step towards the door, but Isabelle beat her to it, laying her hand on the doorknob she glanced once around the room. Everyone readied their weapons in preparation for whatever was on the other side. Jace silently handed Clary her sword, he'd had it strapped to his back in the clearing, the familiar weight of it eased some of the tension in Clary's chest.

Isabelle squared her shoulders, the door swung open, revealing an empty hallway and the sound of raised voices.

They didn't have to go very far before they found the source of the noise. In a large room of indeterminate function there was a raised dais made of scaffolding. On it stood a warlock and Meliorn, whose leaf tattoo was now obscured by a large gash on his face. He'd made no attempts to halt the blood flow, it ran in rivulets down his neck. Kneeling chained to the stage between the bleeding fairy and the angry warlock was Jonathan.

The warlock was shouting, "We should be gone already, the Shadowhunters will be coming for us so stop making a production of this and kill him already so we can leave!" As he spoke Clary realised he had teeth like a wolf.

Despite the dangerous canines Meliorn was staring at him as though he was seriously considering using the sword he was holding against his ally instead of the prisoner at his feet, but he hefted it above his head in a two-handed grip, preparing for an execution.

In a matter of seconds Clary's brother would be dead. She decided to take a page out of Jace's book. "Hey Meliorn, what's up with your face?" Admittedly not her most scathing line, but it worked in a pinch.

The fairy spun to face them but zeroed in, not on Clary, but on someone over her left shoulder, Jace. His rage somehow made his face more lovely, not less.

"You." His fingers tightened around his sword, still poised for the killing blow, but Jonathan was forgotten.

"Me." Jace stepped off to the side, drawing Meliorn's attention from Clary and his siblings. "Sorry about your face by the way, but if you'd just stayed nice and still you'd be dead and none of this would have been a problem."

The fairy's mouth twisted into an inhuman snarl and he charged at Jace. The warlock took advantage of everyone's momentary distraction to open a portal, Isabelle shouted and the three of them that weren't currently locked in mortal combat rushed forward. They weren't fast enough however, and the warlock with wolf's teeth stepped through and was gone.

With no way to know where he was headed no one was stupid enough to follow, so they turned their attention from the closing portal to Jonathan.

He was conscious, barely, they'd kept him alive for some kind of ceremonial execution of the Morgenstern siblings, but they hadn't been gentle. He slumped weakly against Clary once she'd used an unlocking rune on the metal collar chaining him to the dais. The Lightwood siblings hovered a few metres back, giving them privacy as Clary applied a few  _iratze_  runes then sat stroking his hair, matted and stained a rusty colour by his dried blood. They all looked to where Jace was fighting.

Meliorn was good, expert even, but his sword was long and heavy, made for beheadings rather than close-combat fights. He was getting tired. Jace was staying close, crowding Meliorn and not allowing him any of the benefits that came with using a longer weapon. He feigned to one side and as the fairy moved to parry he changed direction, slicing open his opponent's stomach. Meliorn lowered his guard, a second too late to save himself, and Jace took advantage of the opportunity to make an identical slash along Meliorn's throat.

Where before the blood had been trickling from his wounds now it was gushing. His sword clanged to the ground and a second later so did his body. Jace was already turning from him before the body began to fall.

"I'm glad you're not dead." The words came from Jonathan, but he was looking at Alec, not Jace.

Alec looked up from examining his  _parabatai_  for wounds, he seemed a little surprised, either at being addressed or the sentiment of the statement. "I'm glad you're not dead too." He glanced between Jace and Clary, "Though I'd really like to know how this particular daring rescue was pulled off."

Clary knew he was referring to the impossible portal, but she thought instead of the Shadowhunter ambush.

 

_After Clay had explained her plan to Jace they ran back to the Library to give a condensed version to his parents. When they burst through the doors Clary knew they'd walking into something intensely private. Neither Robert nor Maryse were looking at each other. Robert was pacing feverishly, Maryse was so still she looked like she'd been carved from stone, both of them wore naked grief on their faces._

_Clary's heart stumbled, her personal feelings for the elder Lightwoods aside, she felt a connection to them in this moment, she wasn't the only person here terrified for a loved one._

" _Clary has a plan." Jace announced, the effect of their abrupt interruption was instantaneous, cool professionalism sliding seamlessly over the raw emotion on their faces. Even so, Clary couldn't quite meet their eyes as she explained how they would go to the meeting place under the pretence of happily handing her over, and then stall for time._

" _Start organising a war party of Shadowhunters now, have them gathered and on standby ready to portal. When we're in the clearing they'll hopefully be too distracted to be checking in with the Downworlders assigned to watch Warlocks who might help us. As soon as it hits midnight call Magnus Bane and ask him to portal the Shadowhunters to the clearing immediately, he'll do it. We'll stall for as long as we can to give you time. With any luck the Downworlders will surrender as soon as they see they're outmatched."_

_The Lightwoods listened grimly as she talked and when she finished Maryse asked, "What about your brother?"_

" _I have a plan for that too." She didn't elaborate, but apparently she'd earned some good will, they didn't press._

" _Very well," Maryse said, "I believe I have to go make some calls." She looked like she was going to step past Clary but changed her mind at the last second. She reached out and awkwardly patted her shoulder, "Thank you. I know you're risking a lot for my son."_

_Almost tender moment over, she walked briskly out the door. Robert followed behind his wife and though he didn't stop to speak he did incline his head to Clary as he passed._

_She was so tired, she wanted to close her eyes for a few minutes but instead she sighed and said, "We'd better go find Izzy and fill her in as well."_

 

Jonathan groaned softly, "I'm all for thrilling tales of daring rescue but first do you guys think you could finish the rescue itself. I want to get out of here, I'm really beginning to hate this place."


	25. Chapter 25

It had been a month since Alec and Jonathan had been kidnapped, a month since Clary's mother had come home from a holiday to discover her children had almost died at the hands of a Downworlder rebel faction. It had taken a week of screaming arguments before Jocelyn had agreed to let them out of the house, and another week to be allowed to visit the Institute. That was the extent of their mother's permissiveness however. They were allowed at home, at school and at the Institute, nowhere else, and never without each other. It was a fair ruling though. When the members of the group of Downworlders that had performed the kidnapping had been captured and questioned it was revealed that Meliorn was not the leader of the Resistance, just the leader of a splinter group that had become misguided, prioritising revenge against Valentine's legacy over the true objective of the movement. Which no one was any the wiser about. No amount of torture or persuasion caused the Downworlders to give up any information about the Resistance, the only conclusion that could be drawn was that they all had warlock blocks on their minds. With no way of knowing how much animosity the original group harboured against the Morgenstern siblings Clary and Jonathan were on a short leash until further notice.

Apparently, it had been too much to ask of Jonathan, as Clary found herself killing time at the Institute, for the third time that week, covering for him while he went out. He wouldn't tell her what was going on, but she trusted him. Besides, she was fairly sure she wasn't helping him with anything more dangerous than sneaking around with a girl. She wished he'd tell her who though, it couldn't be Isabelle, she and Clary had become close and were often together while Clary was covering for Jon. She guessed that meant whatever flirtation had been between them was over, neither seemed overly upset about it.

Clary was seated on a couch in the Institute's Library, trying to concentrate on her book. The normally unchallenging task had been complicated somewhat by Jace. Who had wandered in ten minutes ago and without discussion or ceremony had lain down beside her, placed his head in her lap and closed his eyes. He looked like he was napping but she'd gone back to her book anyway, only allowing herself a few seconds at a time to look at him, in case he opened his eyes and caught her staring, they'd been dating for weeks now, but she still couldn't keep her eyes off him.

She hadn't read a single word since he walked in.

Giving up, she set her book carefully aside and slowly, tentatively reached out to touch his hair. As her fingertips made contact his eyes opened and he grinned lazily up at her. Sleepy, but not asleep. In a self-satisfied tone he said, "You're an incredibly slow reader, you haven't turned a page once in the whole time I've been here."

"Yeah well, I got distracted by a pompous arse who mistook me for a piece of furniture."

He raised an eyebrow, "I can go, if you want?" he began to sit up. Clary moved her fingers from his hair to rest her palm against his forehead, gently pushing him back down. He smiled and reclosed his eyes, she went back to carefully running her fingers through his hair. They remained like that for a while, and probably would have stayed longer, had it not been for the sound of the Institute's doorbell clanging.

Jace sat up, suddenly alert, they looked warily at each other. No Shadowhunter would ring the doorbell. They made sure to grab their weapons before they went to the front door.

When they reached it, Clary was gratified to see that Jace didn't angle his body in front of hers, the way Jonathan would have. She didn't need to be coddled.

He swung the door open. Standing on the front step, looking bedraggled, frightened and like he hadn't slept in a week, was Simon. "Can somebody please tell me what the hell is going on?"


	26. Chapter 26

**Part Two:**

**A Waking Nightmare**


	27. Chapter 27

Simon Lewis; passable musician, dedicated coffee addict and self-described nerd, had 99 problems. Jace Herondale was all of them. His many and varied offences included, but were not limited to, his unchecked arrogance; Simon had once heard Jace describe himself as 'so handsome he made models question their life choices', the fact that he was dating the girl Simon had had a crush on for many consecutive years (Simon was over her now, but still). And, possibly his most offensive offence, Jace was forcing Simon to run.

Anyone who saw Simon could probably guess that he was not a runner. In high school Simon could be overheard talking about gym class as though it had cast aspersions against his mother. Until recently, he had believed that it was only appropriate to run if you were being chased by a bear, and even then, only if a brisk walk wouldn't suffice.

When Jace had begun training him however, he'd had to revise his thoughts; running was only appropriate if Jace told you to do it, because if you didn't, he'd begin throwing knives. Simon was trying to enlighten Jace to the subtle art of positive reinforcement, but so far, he continued to insist that knives were the best motivator. It was hard to argue with the logic, since Simon was once again running under the threat of deadly projectiles.

He wished briefly that Clary were here, and not just because Jace acted like less of a psychopath when she was around (though that was a plus), Simon just enjoyed her company.

Once there were no more double-life secrets between them Clary and Simon had become good friends. At one point he'd had a rather disastrous crush on her, but it had died quickly once they began spending more time together and he was forced to witness her constantly making gooey eyes at Jace. It's hard to maintain an attraction for someone who was as enamoured with Jace as he was with himself. Despite that, and despite the fact that Clary owned an actual sword that she talked about with an inordinate amount of fondness, she and Simon found that they had a lot in common. Specifically, they found that they were both massive nerds. It was hard to find time to nerd out together though, she was always surrounded by people. Clary was often with Isabelle, who scared Simon as much as she attracted him (he was very, very scared of her). Or with Jon, her brother, who Simon was also very, very scared of, but not in a sexy way. And when she wasn't with either of them there was Jace.

Simon's knife wielding trainer appeared to have a limited set of hobbies outside of torturing Simon. They included; being near Clary, gazing lovingly at Clary from across the room, and absconding with Clary to semi-private hallways to makeout. It had gotten so bad that the residents of the Institute, and regular visitors like Simon and Jonathan, had taken to announcing themselves before they walked around corners. It very rarely helped.

 

 

When Clary stepped into the training room of the Institute the first thing she saw was Jace, standing in the middle of the room and playing with a dagger in a threatening, yet aesthetically pleasing manner.

The second thing she saw was Simon, running laps around the outskirts of the room looking red, sweaty and as though he was entertaining several kinds of unpleasant thoughts all at once. He didn't look up as she approached, but Jace did.

Her heart had skipped a beat when she saw him, and it skipped again when he saw her. It was one thing to know she was dating Jace Herondale, and another thing entirely to see his face light up when she walked into the room.

He put the dagger away and moved toward her. Simon, his eyes having been drawn by the sudden movement of his trainer, finally noticed her. He gave her a small wave and then, seemingly deeming that Jace was occupied enough to risk it, dropped unceremoniously to the floor and lay there panting.

Jace came to a halt in front of her, "Hey you."

"Hey."

"Hey Simon." She called around Jace, he gave a garbled reply, more moan than words.

She looked up at Jace, he was standing close enough that she had to crane her head to see his face, if she wanted to avoid neck strain she'd have to move further away. She didn't move further away. "I'm here for Simon." Simon made another indistinct moan. Jace pouted.

Clary reached up, trying to force his mouth into a smile with her fingers, grinning as she remembered that she'd done this to him the first time they met, when she was delirious with ichor poisoning. Jace's golden eyes danced like he was remembering it too. Her thumb brushed over his lip, he opened his mouth and trapped it gently between his teeth. Her stomach did a complicated swoop.

"No really, we need to go." Her protest sounded weak, even to her own ears. Jace had taken her hand in both of his and was now pressing kisses to it, on her palm, on her wrist.

"We have…" her thoughts were so muddled, "homework. We have homework to do, right Simon?"

Simon moaned.

Jace dropped her hand, she sighed in equal parts relief and disappointment. "Get up Simon, we have to go."

Simon moaned. It was hard to tell, since at that point he'd dispensed with words entirely, but Clary thought he was trying to indicate both that he didn't want to get up, and that even if he had wanted to, he wouldn't be able.

Jace stepped even closer, they were now pressed flush together, she bought her arms up automatically to wrap around his waist. "This doesn't mean you're winning, I'm still going to go…"

His fingers teased the hem of her shirt, brushing feather-light along her hips, "Five minutes." She choked out, "You have five minutes."

She felt more than heard the hum of victory in his chest, and then he was leaning down to capture her mouth in his.

 

"By the Angel!" Clary didn't know how long she and Jace had been standing tangled together (probably longer than five minutes), when they were interrupted by Isabelle.

"Honestly, you'd think the Institute would be big enough that I could avoid seeing these horrible public displays of affection everywhere I turn." She gestured to indicate the size of the room they were in.

"But no, you're everywhere! How are you everywhere? How do you know where I'm going to be?" She looked a little distraught, possibly because Clary and Jace had only separated just enough to look at her.

"Just once I would like to walk into a room and not find you two mauling each other." Chastised, Clary removed her fingers from Jace's hair.

Jace made a low sound of disapproval, glaring at his sister he said, "Until you came barging in this room was private." He glanced dismissively over his shoulder, "Simon doesn't count because he's catatonic." Simon moaned, Clary startled slightly, she'd forgotten he was there.

"Is there a reason you're here? Or did you just feel like ruining my good day?"

Isabelle tossed her hair imperiously, "I came to get you because Hodge wants to see us, all of us. Ruining your day is just a bonus."

She glanced at Simon's slumped form on the floor, "Simon get up." Simon got up.

They all made their way to the door, when Jace caught up with Izzy he tugged on her braid, then ducked hastily as she swiped at him. He did it again then ran, Izzy giving chase down the hallway, shouting curses at his retreating back.

Clary smiled as she watched them run off ahead then glanced sidelong at Simon, "You still alive after all that running?"

Simon moaned.


	28. Chapter 28

Everyone else was already assembled in the library when Clary and Simon arrived. Hodge was seated at his desk looking harried, Simon wasn't sure if this was because of whatever news he was about to impart, or just because Jace and Isabelle were wrestling in the middle of the room.

Their disagreement had apparently only escalated since the hair pulling, Jace was trying to put Izzy in a headlock, both of them laughing and swearing in equal measure. Isabelle's shirt rode-up a little, Simon's cheeks heated. He dragged his gaze away, the last thing he needed was to be caught drooling over her in a room containing two of her three brothers.

Max wasn't in the Library, presumably because he was too young for whatever was about to be discussed, but Alec was. Stood off to the side with Jonathan, both of them looking stoic and aloof. Simon could have sworn though, that both of them were fighting off smiles as they watched the spectacle in the middle of the room.

No one interfered, not even Hodge called them to order. The whole thing felt to Simon a little surreal and off-kilter. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Clary watching them with a soft little smile on her face.

He looked back to the playfully brawling brother and sister and realised why it seemed so unreal to him. Jace played the piano, he nonchalantly quoted 18th century poets, he approached every aspect of his life with obscene amounts of confidence; and Isabelle had the self-possession of several adult women combined. Simon had never seen either of them so young, and judging by the unwillingness of everyone around them to halt the scuffle, they hadn't seen it often either.

Simon wanted to be a Shadowhunter, he really did, but not for the first time he found himself wondering just how much he would be giving up.

 

 

Clary could see that Hodge was getting antsy, regardless of how much everyone wanted to preserve this moment she found herself calling softly, "Jace."

It was enough, he straightened immediately, all at once Jace the Shadowhunter rather than Jace the boy. She mourned his loss a little.

Everyone turned to face their mentor. "As always, there is work to be done. There has been a recent string of gory mundane murders, definitely the work of demons."

Hodge frowned down at the papers he was reading from, "The perplexing thing though, is that they were all in different parts of the city and very obviously committed by different types of demon."

Jace raised an eyebrow in a silent question to Clary, "I hate to be the one to question your judgment Hodge –"

Hodge pursed his lips, "–I very much doubt that"

"But that doesn't seem perplexing at all, it seems like normal demon activity. Why do you think they're connected?"

Alec shot him a wry look, "Maybe if, for once in your life Jace, you stopped talking long enough to listen, Hodge would be able to tell you why he thinks they're connected."

"Why Alec, I've never been more insulted in my life." He bounded to Clary's side and laid his cheek on her head, "Lover, do you hear the way he speaks to me? You must defend my honour!"

At the word  _lover_  the room rang with a chorus of groans and retching sounds, Clary's included. "If you ever call me lover again I'll have to seriously consider stabbing you."

Jace pulled far enough away for her to see his face, his expression simmered a little, the way it always did when she was threatening violence.

"Oh, by the Angel! Do you see their expressions? This is like some kind of twisted foreplay for them!" Isabelle turned imploringly to Hodge, "Please give me the address so I can go feed myself to a demon!"

"Or better yet," Alec added dryly, "so we can feed Jace to a demon."

Hodge spoke before Jace could retort, "You're not going to the address of the demon. You're going to the apartment of the residences of the victims. I think these murders are connected," he glared at Jace, "because every single victim was reported as behaving irrational, paranoid and delusional in the weeks leading up to their deaths. I want to know if there is something in their homes, something of the Shadow World, causing this."

He handed Alec a piece of paper with addresses written on it, "You have three houses to check so I suggest you get going quickly."

Alec glanced at the addresses then at the group, "It would go quicker if we split up but…" He glanced uneasily at Clary.

Jace finished his train of thought, "But who knows what unspeakable things could happen to us. We've gained an unusually large number of enemies recently, even by my standards, which is impressive, I make a lot of enemies."

Alec shot his  _parabatai_  a look that was half affection, half exasperation, "The fact that you can't open your mouth without pissing someone off shouldn't really be a source of pride for you Jace."

Clary felt Jace shrug, "and yet…"

Hodge clapped his hands together, "All of you, go now. You can trade quips on the journey. Out of my nice, previously quiet library."

 

 

The first mundane they went to investigate lived alone in an apartment, full of the little odds and ends that people decorate their houses with because they love them, rather than because they fit an overarching theme. It was homey and really too small for five Shadowhunters and a Shadowhunter-in-training to cohabit; even for temporary, investigative purposes Simon reflected as he pressed himself against a wall to make room for Jace's manic pacing.

Simon wasn't really sure why he was there, as the only contribution he was making was staying out of the way of the people who were actually doing things. Though he supposed that was more of a contribution than Jace was making, who was moving around erratically, opening cupboards and draws seemingly at random and then closing them just as quickly, climbing precariously onto furniture for no discernible reason, and occasionally, stopping to tidy something. Alec was moving along after his whirlwind at a more sedate pace, re-opening the compartments Jace had given a cursory once-over and thoroughly checking their contents.

While being relatively new to the Shadow World, Simon had learned enough to know that Jace was a big deal, with a great or terrible future ahead of him, depending on where you stood. It seemed ridiculous to Simon, as he watched the  _parabatai_  work, people always seemed to forget that Jace was a part of a team.

The words were out of his mouth before he had a chance to remember that to speak to Jace, or really, to speak within earshot of Jace, was to give an invitation to be mocked, "What do you think you'd be Jace, if you didn't have Alec?"

Jace paused for a moment, "Dead. I'd be dead."

It was such an unexpectedly honest answer, so completely free of Jace's usual hubris, that everyone in the room grew silent for a moment.

He took it as an opportunity to rocket into the bedroom, a second later his voice rang out, "I have found a draw full of panties. Admittedly, during my wild youth I would have had no compunctions against searching through it, but I'm a changed man. I could not possibly touch the underwear of anyone but my beloved."

Clary looked a little mortified, Jonathan looked as though he fervently wished he had gone deaf before he'd ever had to hear that sentence.

"Alec! Come in here an look through this girl's underwear for me."

Alec turned an unflattering shade of red and made a strangled choking sound. Clary sighed and walked into the bedroom, "I'll search the bloody draw." Then he heard her say in an undertone "Just because you're uncomfortable with sincerity doesn't mean you should make Alec uncomfortable as well just to make yourself feel better."

"Alec's always uncomfortable." Jace made no effort to lower his voice.

"I can hear you you know!" Alec's reply made Simon jump, he hadn't realised he wasn't the only one still listening in.

"I know!" Jace's response was followed almost immediately by a muffled thump, which Simon strongly suspected was the sound of Clary hitting him.

Alec smiled and went back to searching cupboards.

Not long afterwards Clary's voice sounded, "I've got something!"


	29. Chapter 29

Everyone crowded into the bedroom, Jon glancing suspiciously between the bed and Jace and Clary as he entered, Clary decided not to dignify the implied, and paranoid, accusation with a response.

Instead, she spread the girl's journal across the covers, trying to let as many of the group see it as possible. She flipped through the pages, most of it was neat, orderly. Legible handwriting that detailed a normal, mortal life. The unreasonable demands her mean boss made of her on a day-to-day basis; her one snide co-worker who still had nothing on the rudeness of the customers; the guy she liked at her gym who misheard her name when she introduced herself and how she'd let him call her Christy so long now that she had no idea how to go about correcting him.

The toward the end it changed abruptly, becoming erratic and scared, filled with stories of sightings of terrifying monsters no one else could see. It would look, to the mortal police, like a decent into madness. To the Shadowhunters who knew better it looked worse than that.

"So, whatever happened to Simon is happening again?" Jace was trying for nonchalance but Clary could here the tension in his voice.

"Maybe not, maybe she really did just go crazy." Izzy didn't sound convinced enough of her own comment for anyone to bother arguing with her.

Alec plucked the journal out from under Clary's hands, "Why is this even still here though? Mundie police collect evidence, right?" He glanced at Clary for confirmation that he was understanding police procedure correctly, "Shouldn't this have been taken?"

Jace snorted as he smoothed the bedcovers, fixing the slight disturbance Clary had made when she'd put the journal down on top of them, "Because a Mundane is going to read through that and conclude that it's vital proof that she was eaten by demons?"

"Hodge told Alec and I that her death was officially ruled as a dog attack," Jon said from the back of the group, "I guess in that context 'crazy lady' doesn't seem relevant."

Alec handed the journal off to Simon and consulted the piece of paper Hodge had given them the addresses on, "We still have two apartments to check, it's not time to draw conclusions yet, this discussion can be shelved until after we have all the facts."

He lead the way out of the bedroom and out of the apartment, the rest of the group trailing behind, Jace stopped to straighten a picture on the wall then fell into step beside Clary. He called over his shoulder to Simon, who'd fallen furthest back, "Bring the girl's journal, it could have something in it that we missed."

Simon didn't answer until everyone had filed out of the apartment and the door had been re-locked behind them.

He shoved the journal into Jace's chest with enough force that it would have sent a mundane sprawling, "Her name was Cora. Not 'mundane'. Not 'crazy lady'. Not 'the girl'. Cora. It was written on the first page, none of you even looked."

Clary suddenly felt sick. No, she hadn't looked, too focused on finding out how Cora had died to think much at all about what she'd been when she was alive.

Simon's face was still white with rage, he backed away from the group, not looking anyone in the face, "You can finish your bout of home invasion without me, I'm going home. I'm done with your elitist bullshit for tonight."

He stalked down the hall and disappeared from sight. Clary was about to go after him, but Izzy beat her to it, after a couple of steps she turned back "I'm going to…" seemingly unable to find an adequate end to her sentence, she jerked her chin in the direction Simon had gone. Her voice sounded uncertain, but her face was set defiantly, as though waiting for someone to try and stop her. When no one did she left without another word.

 

 

The search of the other two apartments was a quiet affair, Simon's parting words obviously weighed on the minds of everyone else just as they were weighing on Clary's.

Her myriad of secrets meant that she'd never really gotten close to any of the mundanes she knew, but she'd thought her atypical upbringing had spared her from the superiority complex most Shadowhunters were bred into. Shame coiled thick in her chest, she was supposed to be better than this.

 _Always your father's daughter_  a nasty voice whispered in the back of her mind.

Jace still held Cora's journal in his hands, "So, since neither Lee nor Amy's apartments yielded any information or potential causes," everyone had gone out of their way at the second and third residences to make sure they knew the names of the victims, "I for one, am really looking forward to telling Hodge that we have absolutely nothing except this." He brandished the journal in the air, "Which is practically nothing."

Jon sighed, "As fun as that conversation sounds, Clary and I have to get home. Our mother has been threatening to ground us for eternity since that's the only way she'll ever get a chance to see us anymore. She's only kind-of joking."

He was right, the sun was starting to sink below the horizon and if they missed another family dinner they'd probably find themselves barricaded in their rooms like fairy-tale princesses.

"Fine." Jace turned to Alec, "Guess it's just me and you then."

Alec turned faintly pink, "Actually, I also have somewhere to be."

"Where?" Jace asked suspiciously, "And with who?"

Alec looked as though he'd be happy to be late for an appointment in hell if it would get him out of this conversation, "With—. It's none of your—. I don't have to—. I'm going." Alec spluttered, he turned sharply on his heel and marched away.

Jace watched him go with a fond expression on his face, "His ears have gone an alarming shade of red." He looked down at the journal in his hands, "Guess it's just you then, Jace." He shot a mock accusatory look at Clary, "Staggering loyalty you're showing here by the way, glad to know I have a girlfriend who's got my back."

Clary shrugged and went up on her toes, "You could always dump me for someone better."

He shook his head at her attempts to reach him and leaned down to bridge the distance between their mouths, "Impossible." He mumbled against her lips.

Jon made a retching sound from somewhere off to their left.


End file.
